OpenClaw or Hermes Agent? How to pick your first AI agent

The first question almost everyone asks us is the same: which one should I deploy? It’s a fair question. OpenClaw and Hermes Agent are both open source, both live in the chat apps you already use, and both can research, browse and get real work done. We host both all day, every day, so here is the honest answer.

What they have in common

Before the differences, the overlap. Whichever you pick, you get a real assistant, not a toy:

• They meet you in WhatsApp, Telegram, Discord, Slack and more. No new app to learn.
• They do things: web research, browsing, files, email, scheduled tasks.
• They’re open source with huge communities. Your agent, your data, no lock-in.
• On PlusAgents, both deploy in one click with LLM credits included, starting free.

Choose OpenClaw if you want the crowd favorite

OpenClaw is the most popular personal AI assistant on the planet, with 388k+ GitHub stars and an enormous plugin ecosystem. That popularity is a feature: whatever you want your agent to do, someone has probably already built a skill for it, written a guide about it, or answered the exact question you were about to ask.

It’s the safe, delightful default. If you want an assistant that handles everyday life, answering in your group chats, digging through email, chasing down a refund, comparing flight prices, OpenClaw feels like magic on day one.

Choose Hermes Agent if you want it to grow

Hermes Agent, built by Nous Research, has one trick nothing else has: a built-in learning loop. After a complex task it writes itself a reusable skill. It searches its own past conversations, and it builds a model of who you are that deepens across sessions.

Day one, it’s a very good assistant. Week four, it’s your assistant: it knows your projects, your preferences and the way you like things done. If you plan to delegate the same kinds of work repeatedly, research briefs, weekly reports, code reviews, Hermes compounds.

Our honest take: try both, keep your favorite

This is the part where a normal pricing page would push you toward the expensive option. Ours is simpler: the free plan costs $0 and takes about a minute to deploy. Start one of each, message them for a few days from your favorite chat app, and keep the one that clicks. Plans are per agent, and free agents auto-sleep when idle, so trying both costs you exactly nothing.

And if you change your mind later, you can switch which agent a plan runs whenever you like. Your first agent is one click away.