Hermes Agent
An autonomous agent that runs on your own server with persistent memory.
- Open Source
- Self-hosted (Linux, macOS, Windows, WSL2), CLI, Desktop App, API, Telegram Bot, Discord Bot, Slack, WhatsApp, Signal, Email, Android (Termux)
- Open source
- Free forever
What is Hermes Agent?
Key features
Self-improving learning loop
Creates skills from experience, refines them during use, and recalls how it solved past problems.
Persistent memory and user modelling
Full-text search across past conversations plus Honcho dialectic modelling to build a lasting picture of the user.
Unified messaging gateway
One process connects Telegram, Discord, Slack, WhatsApp, Signal, Email, SMS, Matrix, Teams and 20+ other platforms with conversation continuity across them.
Natural language cron scheduling
Define recurring reports, backups and briefings in plain English that run unattended through the gateway.
Isolated subagents
Delegates and parallelises work in separate conversations, terminals and Python RPC scripts for zero-context-cost pipelines.
Multiple deployment backends
Runs on local, Docker, SSH, Singularity, Modal and Daytona, with serverless hibernation and container hardening.
Built-in tools and model flexibility
40-60+ tools (web search, browser automation, vision, image generation, text-to-speech), MCP integration and 200+ models via OpenRouter, Nous Portal, OpenAI and custom endpoints.
Pros & cons
Advantages
- The agent software is fully open source under the MIT licence, with no per-seat charges or paywalled features.
- It self-hosts on the user's own server, so data and conversations stay under the user's control rather than on a vendor's cloud.
- It works across more than 20 messaging platforms plus a CLI and desktop app, letting a conversation start in one place and continue in another.
- Provider flexibility avoids vendor lock-in: users can switch between 200+ models or run local inference with Ollama or vLLM at no API cost.
- Persistent memory and auto-generated skills mean it retains project context and past solutions between sessions.
- Serverless backends such as Modal and Daytona hibernate when idle, keeping running costs low between sessions.
Limitations
- It is self-hosted, so users must provision and maintain a server (roughly 5 to 7 dollars a month for a basic VPS) and configure the install themselves.
- Running it still incurs model API costs unless local inference is used, so the headline open-source price is not the full cost of ownership.
- Setup involves command-line installation and several backend and provider choices, which is more technical than a hosted chatbot.
- Official subscription pricing centres on the separate Nous Portal for models and tools rather than the agent itself, which can make total cost harder to estimate upfront.
Use cases
Developers and engineers who want an autonomous agent that learns a codebase or project and retains how it solved past problems.
Power users who run unattended scheduled tasks such as daily reports, backups and briefings through natural language cron.
Teams that want a single agent reachable across Telegram, Discord, Slack and email without switching tools.
Privacy-conscious users who need a self-hosted agent on their own server rather than a third-party cloud service.
Researchers generating batch trajectories and training datasets through subagents and trajectory export.
Home automation and personal-assistant users connecting the agent to Home Assistant and voice for hands-free tasks.
Ready to try Hermes Agent?
Pricing
Hermes Agent (self-hosted)
Free
Open source under the MIT licence; all capabilities included, user pays only for their own server and model API usage.
Nous Portal Free
Free
0 dollars a month with around 0.10 dollars in monthly credits and pay-as-you-go top-ups; access to bundled models and tools for evaluation.
Nous Portal Plus
20 per month
22 dollars in monthly usage credit across 300+ models plus web search, image generation, text-to-speech and browser automation.
Nous Portal Super
100 per month
110 dollars in monthly usage credit with higher rate limits and the same bundled models and core tools.
Nous Portal Ultra
200 per month
220 dollars in monthly usage credit and the highest rate limits across all plans.
Get started with Hermes Agent
Click through to Hermes Agent and start using it now.
- Open source
- Free forever