AgentScout / Best lists / OpenHands alternatives
OpenHands alternatives (2026)
OpenHands is a coding tool: Open-source platform for autonomous coding agents. Pricing, as the maker states it: Open source + paid cloud. Its GitHub repo has 90,845 stars. We found 141 tools in the directory that do overlapping work (writing code); 106 of them are open source and 9 list a free or freemium plan. Below are the 10 closest, ranked by how many tasks and sub-tasks they share with OpenHands, then by GitHub stars.
- Cline (Open source): Autonomous coding agent inside VS Code with step-by-step approvals. Consider it because it also covers IDE and editor agents.
- Open SWE (Open source): LangChain's asynchronous coding agent that takes work from GitHub issues, Slack or Linear, implements it in an isolated sandbox and opens a pull request. Consider it because it also covers code review and agents in chat apps.
- mini-SWE-agent (Open source): Tiny 100-line agent that solves GitHub issues or helps on the command line, from the SWE-agent team. Consider it because it also covers terminal and CLI agents.
- Roomote (Freemium): Cloud coding agent from the Roo Code team that runs your real dev environment, verifies its work, reviews code with a second model and hands back PRs with live previews; works from Slack, Teams, GitHub and Linear, self-hosted or on its cloud. Consider it because it also covers code review and agents in chat apps.
- BackAnt Kairos (Free): Backant's Kairos, an autonomous developer that runs Claude Code against your repository. Consider it because it does the same job with a different approach (free).
- Devin (Freemium): Cognition's autonomous software engineer that takes tickets and opens PRs. Consider it because it does the same job with a different approach (freemium). OpenHands vs Devin →
- opencode (Open source): Open-source terminal coding agent that works with many model providers. Consider it because it also covers terminal and CLI agents; it has more GitHub stars (213,329 vs 90,845).
- Claude Code (Paid): Anthropic's terminal coding agent that edits code, runs commands and handles git. Consider it because it is a managed commercial product, if you'd rather not run it yourself; it also covers terminal and CLI agents; it has more GitHub stars (150,707 vs 90,845).
- CC Switch (Open source): Desktop manager for Claude Code, Codex, Gemini CLI, OpenCode, OpenClaw and other coding agents that switches API providers in one click and manages MCP servers, skills and prompts. Consider it because it is ready to use without building anything; it also covers computer and desktop control and MCP servers; it has more GitHub stars (145,685 vs 90,845).
- OpenAI Codex CLI (Open source): OpenAI's open-source coding agent for the terminal; also runs in the cloud. Consider it because it also covers terminal and CLI agents; it has more GitHub stars (129,112 vs 90,845).
OpenHands vs alternatives at a glance
| Tool | Pricing | Open source / licence | GitHub stars | Good for |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| OpenHands | Open source + cloud | MIT | 90,845 | writing code |
| Cline | Open source | Apache License 2.0 | 70,289 | writing code |
| Open SWE | Open source | MIT | 11,034 | writing code, reviewing pull requests |
| mini-SWE-agent | Open source | MIT | 8,580 | writing code, coding in the terminal |
| Roomote | Freemium | Fair Core License 1.0 (converts to Apache 2.0 later) | 288 | writing code, reviewing pull requests |
| BackAnt Kairos | Free | No | — | writing code |
| Devin | Freemium | No | — | writing code, reviewing pull requests |
| opencode | Open source | MIT | 213,329 | writing code, coding in the terminal |
| Claude Code | Paid | Proprietary (All rights reserved; Anthropic Commercial Terms of Service) | 150,707 | writing code, coding in the terminal |
| CC Switch | Open source | Yes | 145,685 | writing code, coding in the terminal |
| OpenAI Codex CLI | Open source | Apache License 2.0 | 129,112 | writing code, coding in the terminal |
Written comparisons: Devin vs OpenHands
More: OpenHands listing · All coding tools · All alternatives pages
Related searches: Free AI coding agents · Open-source AI coding agents · AI coding agents for the terminal (CLI)
Alternatives are picked from directory data only: same category plus shared tasks and sub-tasks. Pricing is as each maker states it; GitHub stars as recorded on each listing.