OpenHands is the open-source platform closest in ambition: a web frontend over one or more agent servers, Docker sandboxes, any model, and automations from Slack, GitHub, Linear and Notion. It is a general agent runner you host. TaskTrooper is narrower and more opinionated: a desktop app, a fixed delivery lifecycle, role agents that own columns, and QA and deploy stages that are part of the product rather than something you script.
| Dimension | OpenHands | TaskTrooper |
|---|---|---|
| Where it runs | Local, Docker sandbox, remote VMs, or OpenHands Cloud. | On your Mac: the desktop app starts an embedded Postgres, the Go backend and the agent sessions. Nothing hosted. |
| Who starts the work | You, or an automation server on a schedule or webhook. | The board. A card entering a column is dispatched to that column's agent; nobody presses run. |
| Roles | Agents (OpenHands, Claude Code, Codex, Gemini via ACP), configured per profile; no role model. | Six role agents (PM, architect, backend, frontend, mobile, QA) with seeded skills, rules, tool policies and memory. Add your own from a template or from scratch, and give each agent its own runtime: one board can mix Claude Code, Cursor, OpenCode, Antigravity and API models. |
| Parallel agents and tools | Multiple agent servers and conversations; capabilities configured per profile, no role separation. | Several tasks run at once (three sessions by default), each in its own workspace, branch and CLI session. Each role has its own tool policy, so the backend agent runs the test suite while QA drives a browser against another build and the architect reads a third task's pull request. QA has no code tools; the architect reviews and does not implement. |
| Lifecycle | Conversation and task list; GitHub issues become tasks. | Thirteen columns out of the box: analysis review, code review, QA, PM UAT, human UAT, Done merges, Released watches the deploy. |
| QA | Whatever the agent runs. | A QA agent that cannot pass a task without executing: real requests, headless browser, iOS/Android simulators. |
| After merge | None built in; automations can be scripted. | Deploy recipes, health checks, incidents from Alertmanager/Sentry/webhooks, rollback, App Store and Play releases. |
| Models | Any LLM through profiles. | Claude Code, Cursor, Antigravity and OpenCode as local processes; Anthropic, OpenAI, Gemini, Groq or any OpenAI-compatible API. |
| Interface | Web UI you host. | Desktop app for macOS, Windows and Linux. |
| License | MIT. | Apache-2.0. |
Choose OpenHands if
- You want a general agent runner for more than software delivery.
- You want to host it for a team on a server.
- You want to compose your own workflow from agents and automations.
Choose TaskTrooper if
- You want the delivery workflow already built: board, owners, review, QA, merge, deploy.
- One person, one machine, nothing to host.
- You want agents to improve their own skills from results.
github.com/OpenHands/OpenHands MITDescribed from public documentation; if something is out of date, open an issue.