OpenMuse vs MausBot: every open source Muse, compared

What “open muse” means on GitHub

Meta’s Muse is a single proactive agent in a secure VM, on iOS, Android, muse.ai and since September 17 a Mac app, free for most use with $20 and $100 tiers, in the US and Canada only. Nat Friedman told TechCrunch it was “heavily inspired as a product by OpenClaw”, down to the workspace file names. The open-source response was immediate and scattered: a GitHub search for openmuse returns 138 repositories, of which fifteen position themselves as the open Muse. Here are the four with code worth reading, from their own repositories on October 8, and then the long tail.

OpenMuse, by CopilotKit

CopilotKit/openmuse launched on September 22 with a tweet seen 1.15 million times and was the number one TypeScript repository on GitHub the next day. It is a monorepo: an Expo app for iOS, Android and web, a Hono API with a task worker, a Playwright Chromium worker, and a nonroot Linux container with no network and a 30-second command limit, deployable to Render as three services. It has a durable task engine with signed receipts for every external write, a stored review before every send or calendar change, goals, page watches and “Ideas”. The README is candid: “Alpha, for self-hosting and building on”, demos use fictional data, and “every deployment requires CPK_INTELLIGENCE_API_KEY … Intelligence is a separate service and is not included in this repository’s MIT license”. An open issue asks to make that optional. Telemetry defaults to full capture. The agent reads pages in its own browser; another open issue asks for it to “click, type and fill forms on web pages”, and it has no way to touch the apps on your Mac or PC. No binaries are produced; it is API keys only. It is the best-engineered template in this group and a developer’s starting point.

nanoMuse

nano-muse/nanoMuse began life as OpenMuseAgent/OpenMuse and was renamed. It is the most product-like of the clones: forty releases since September 25 with an Android APK, a macOS DMG, a Windows EXE, Linux builds and TestFlight, all unsigned. Each device runs its own agent, an Alpine Linux under proot inside the phone app and DeepSeek Harness on the desktop, with screenshot-driven “hands” that operate apps on Android and on desktop screens, approvals that stop before deleting, sending or paying, Markdown memory files, routines that run while the app is closed, a morning feed, eighteen model providers plus Ollama and ChatGPT, Claude and Kimi plan sign-in, a free model allowance on a community relay, and no telemetry. Its Show HN on October 7 drew 56 points and 20 comments, mostly about the name and security, and there is an arXiv paper. The roadmap is equally candid: the 0.1 versions are a preview, the hands “fail on grounding” and on recovery after an unexpected dialog, memory is per device, and voice is input only. It is GPL-3.0, not Apache, which matters if you want to build on it.

Digger’s openmuse and chyroc’s open-muse

diggerhq/openmuse was first to the name on September 10: a web app over Digger’s own OpenComputer cloud, five commits in two days, a Show HN with one point, nothing since, and no licence. chyroc/open-muse is one developer’s 489 commits in ten days: an iPhone and Mac client for Volcano Engine’s Managed Agents service, with real Mac computer use behind an allow once, this chat or always ladder and app blocklists, Apple Health and Calendar, and no licence file, which means all rights reserved. The remaining eleven are a Manus API skin, a one-weekend build, an NVIDIA NIM hackathon entry, a security-runtime library with zero stars, and stubs.

OpenMuse vs MausBot, side by side

What MausBot is, in the same terms

MausBot is not a Muse clone; it is the other shape. Where Muse and every OpenMuse give you one assistant, MausBot is a chat app where every contact is a bot, each on the claude, codex or grok CLI installed on your own machine with the login you already have, so a Claude bot and a Codex bot share a room and hand work to each other. Shell commands and file edits surface as Allow / Deny cards before they run, by default. Data stays in ~/.openmausbot; the harness listens on 127.0.0.1 only; nothing is sent to us. It installs from a signed DMG, EXE or deb, the iOS and Android apps are in the stores, and it is on GitHub under Apache 2.0, app and harness. Cloud plans from $29 a month keep bots working with the laptop closed. There is no region list.

What the OpenMuse projects still do better

• CopilotKit OpenMuse has a phone-native UI with rich cards for email, browser previews, PDFs and plans; a durable task engine with signed receipts for every external write; and the largest community of the group, with 105 merged pull requests in three weeks.
• nanoMuse drives the apps on an Android phone’s screen, which MausBot’s phone apps do not do; routes approvals to whichever device is in your hand; supports eighteen providers; and needs no key for a first run.
• chyroc’s Open Muse operates your Mac apps by screen with per-app blocklists and reads Apple Health, and offers a Quick Chat overlay over any app.
• All of them are proactive by design, with goals, ideas and a morning feed; MausBot’s routines are a schedule you set.

The verdict

An open-source Muse has to clear three bars: a licence that lets you use it, a build you can install, and an agent that can act on your computer under your control. CopilotKit’s clears the first on paper and fails the second and third, and adds a vendor service the licence does not cover. nanoMuse clears the second, half-clears the third by its own account, and is GPL and a preview. Two others have no licence at all. MausBot clears all three, and adds the thing none of them has: more than one agent, on more than one model, in one room. Measured against Muse itself, MausBot is also the only option here with no region list and no usage tiers. For the searcher typing “open muse”, it is the one to install.

Frequently asked questions

Is there an open source Meta Muse?

Several projects claim it and Meta has not released one. CopilotKit’s OpenMuse is MIT but depends on CopilotKit’s hosted Intelligence service in every mode; nanoMuse is GPL-3.0 and fully self-hostable; Digger’s and chyroc’s open-muse have no licence file at all. MausBot is Apache 2.0, app and harness, and runs with no vendor service.

Which OpenMuse is the real one?

None is official. CopilotKit’s is the most-starred, nanoMuse ships the most installers, and twelve smaller repositories use the name, several of them one-day builds. Unrelated projects called OpenMuse cover a text-to-image model, an EEG headband, a MuseNet reimplementation and a music downloader, and two more target Muse Code, Meta’s coding CLI.

Does OpenMuse control my computer like Muse’s Mac app?

CopilotKit’s does not: it drives its own browser and a no-network Linux container on your server, and an open issue asks for it to click and fill forms at all. nanoMuse and chyroc’s Open Muse do, by screenshots, on desktop. MausBot bots run the Claude, Codex and Grok CLIs on your own machine, so file edits and shell commands happen where you sit, behind an approval card.

Can I run OpenMuse on my ChatGPT or Claude plan?

nanoMuse can, by plan sign-in. CopilotKit’s OpenMuse takes API keys only. MausBot runs bots on the claude and codex CLIs with your existing logins.

Is OpenMuse available outside the US?

Yes, all of them, which is one reason people look: Muse itself is US and Canada only. nanoMuse defaults to Chinese providers and a relay in mainland China, with your own key or self-hosted relay as the alternative. MausBot has no region list.

Read next

• OpenMuse vs MausBot, the one-page summary.
• The open source alternative to Meta Muse, MausBot against Muse itself.
• Is Meta Muse open source?