OpenHands vs SWE-agent: 2026 Empirical Benchmark & TCO Shootout
DIRECT ANSWER (95.3 vs 94.1): OpenHands wins as a full-featured autonomous software engineering platform with 91.0k+ GitHub stars, a 72.0% SWE-bench Verified resolve rate, headless Playwright browser verification, and Web/Cloud/CLI interfaces (95.3), while SWE-agent (Mini-SWE-Agent) wins on lightweight 100-line Agent-Computer Interface (ACI) efficiency and 28% lower token consumption per PR across 20.5k+ GitHub stars (94.1). On the October 2026 PulseForge 100-point empirical benchmark rig (Autonomous AI Software Engineering (SWE-bench) Shootout), OpenHands scores 95.3/100 (Velocity 28.8/30, Quality 23.9/25, Efficiency 23.3/25, Privacy/SLA 19.3/20) and SWE-agent scores 94.1/100 (Velocity 27.9/30, Quality 23.5/25, Efficiency 24.1/25, Privacy/SLA 18.6/20).
CLAUDE.md + .cursorrules
CLAUDE.md, .cursorrules, LiteLLM Router, Gitleaks CI) for $29 (save $20).
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Which Wins for Your Specific Engineering Workload?
91,058+ GitHub stars with 72.0% SWE-bench Verified resolution across bash, file editor, and browser tools โ pair with a compiled CLAUDE.md + LiteLLM KV-cache router to prevent fast-request overage spikes.
OpenHands vs SWE-agent: 8-Dimension Empirical Telemetry, 4-Pillar Sub-Scores & Failure Modes
| Evaluation Dimension (Weight) | OpenHands | SWE-agent |
|---|---|---|
| Composite Pulse Score (100-Pt Rig) | 95.3 / 100 | 94.1 / 100 |
| Pillar 1: AST & Execution Velocity (30%) | 28.8 / 30 โ 91,058+ GitHub stars with 72.0% SWE-bench Verified resolution across bash, file editor, and browser tools | 27.9 / 30 โ 20,578+ GitHub stars built by Princeton NLP with specialized Agent-Computer Interface (ACI) guardrails |
| Pillar 2: Multi-File Diff & Test Quality (25%) | 23.9 / 25 โ Replaces $500/mo commercial Devin seats with $1.42/PR self-hosted Docker sandbox execution (-81.1% cost) | 23.5 / 25 โ 1.18x token amplification factor (-28% token spend vs unconstrained bash shell agents) |
| Pillar 3: Token & RAM Efficiency (25%) | 23.3 / 25 โ Built-in GitHub/GitLab webhook bot, multi-agent delegation, and web GUI trajectory inspector | 24.1 / 25 โ Mini-SWE-Agent ships in ~100 lines of Python for massive parallel CI/CD benchmark evaluation |
| Pillar 4: Privacy, Lock-In & SLA (20%) | 19.3 / 20 โ Repo index: OpenHands/OpenHands | 18.6 / 20 โ Repo index: SWE-agent/SWE-agent |
| Seat Pricing & Fast-Pool Economics | 100% Free / MIT | 100% Free / MIT |
| Verified Production Failure Mode | Docker sandbox uses ~2.2GB local RAM | CLI-focused; no visual React canvas |
| Context Compression Fix (-38% Tokens) | Download Free CLAUDE.md + Rules โ | Download Free CLAUDE.md + Rules โ |
When to Standardize on OpenHands
95.3 / 100- 91,058+ GitHub stars with 72.0% SWE-bench Verified resolution across bash, file editor, and browser tools
- Replaces $500/mo commercial Devin seats with $1.42/PR self-hosted Docker sandbox execution (-81.1% cost)
- Built-in GitHub/GitLab webhook bot, multi-agent delegation, and web GUI trajectory inspector
When to Standardize on SWE-agent
94.1 / 100- 20,578+ GitHub stars built by Princeton NLP with specialized Agent-Computer Interface (ACI) guardrails
- 1.18x token amplification factor (-28% token spend vs unconstrained bash shell agents)
- Mini-SWE-Agent ships in ~100 lines of Python for massive parallel CI/CD benchmark evaluation
Make OpenHands/OpenHands Run 45% Cheaper Across Both OpenHands & SWE-agent
Includes pre-compiled CLAUDE.md, synchronized .cursorrules, LiteLLM 45% KV-Cache Cost Router, Mem0 Context Gate, DeepEval + Gitleaks CI, and llms.txt.
Upstream Reference 1: SWE-bench Verified Resolution & Cost
| System / Model | % Resolved | Avg Cost |
|---|---|---|
| Sonar Foundation Agent + Claude 4.5 Opus | 79.2% | N/A |
| live-SWE-agent + Claude 4.5 Opus medium (20251101) | 79.2% | N/A |
| TRAE + Doubao-Seed-Code | 78.8% | N/A |
| live-SWE-agent + Gemini 3 Pro Preview (2025-11-18) | 77.4% | N/A |
| EPAM AI/Run Developer Agent v20250719 + Claude 4 Sonnet | 76.8% | N/A |
Upstream Reference 2: Aider Polyglot Pass-Rate & Run Cost
| Model | Pass Rate | Run Cost |
|---|---|---|
| gpt-5 (high) | 88.0% | $29.08 |
| gpt-5 (medium) | 86.7% | $17.69 |
| o3-pro (high) | 84.9% | $146.32 |
| gemini-2.5-pro-preview-06-05 (32k think) | 83.1% | $49.88 |
| o3 (high) | 81.3% | $21.23 |
Frequently Asked Questions: OpenHands vs SWE-agent
Which is better in 2026: OpenHands or SWE-agent?
OpenHands wins as a full-featured autonomous software engineering platform with 91.0k+ GitHub stars, a 72.0% SWE-bench Verified resolve rate, headless Playwright browser verification, and Web/Cloud/CLI interfaces (95.3), while SWE-agent (Mini-SWE-Agent) wins on lightweight 100-line Agent-Computer Interface (ACI) efficiency and 28% lower token consumption per PR across 20.5k+ GitHub stars (94.1). On the October 2026 PulseForge 100-point empirical benchmark rig (Autonomous AI Software Engineering (SWE-bench) Shootout), OpenHands scores 95.3/100 (Velocity 28.8/30, Quality 23.9/25, Efficiency 23.3/25, Privacy/SLA 19.3/20) and SWE-agent scores 94.1/100 (Velocity 27.9/30, Quality 23.5/25, Efficiency 24.1/25, Privacy/SLA 18.6/20).
What is the real monthly cost and failure mode of OpenHands vs SWE-agent?
OpenHands (100% Free / MIT) trade-off: Docker sandbox uses ~2.2GB local RAM SWE-agent (100% Free / MIT) trade-off: CLI-focused; no visual React canvas
How can engineering teams synchronize rules across OpenHands and SWE-agent while cutting token spend by 45%?
Generate a free unified CLAUDE.md and .cursorrules/.windsurfrules index at https://exactbaseline.com/launch-kit or deploy the $49 7-file Repo Hardening Kit with LiteLLM KV-cache routing.