claude-mem vs headroom
The two are close in size: 93.2k stars for claude-mem, 69.0k for headroom. Over the days we have tracked them claude-mem moved +6.6% and headroom +15.9%, so headroom is growing faster right now.
Neither one leads on the six capability axes, so the choice comes down to which of them fits the way you already work.
Stars and commit dates come from our own daily tracking. The six axes are read off each project's documentation by our review pipeline, so they describe what a project says about itself, not what we measured in its code.
Where they stand today
Claude-Mem pairs a Claude Code–focused persistent memory with progressive-disclosure search tools and a local worker/web UI to deliver token-efficient, session-persistent context.
- Stars
- 93.2k
- Tracked growth
- +6.6%
- Maturity
- ●●●●●
- Last commit
- 5h ago
- Language
- JavaScript
- License
- Apache-2.0
- Cost to run
- Your API key for model calls; optional cloud backup to cmem.ai
Local-first, reversible context compression that both shrinks prompts and actively reduces model output tokens via a drop-in proxy and cross-agent memory.
- Stars
- 69.0k
- Tracked growth
- +15.9%
- Maturity
- ●●●●●
- Last commit
- 6h ago
- Language
- Python
- License
- Apache-2.0
- Cost to run
- Local software is free; LLM calls use your API key.
Six axes, head to head
Each axis runs 0 to 5. The label under a score is what that project's own docs claim, not a category average.
| Axis | claude-mem | headroom |
|---|---|---|
Context depth How much of your codebase it sees before it answers: the open diff, the diff plus related files, or the whole repository. | ●●●●● Related files & memory | ●●●●● Diff + related files |
Noise control How it keeps output volume down — severity thresholds, deduplication, incremental runs over new commits only. | ●●●●● Configurable filters | ●●●●● Dedup & shaping |
Customization How far it bends to your team: custom rules, prompts, style guides, per-path config. | ●●●●● Config file & modes | ●●●●● Rich CLI & config |
Privacy Whether your code stays on your own infrastructure: fully local, self-hostable, or cloud API only. | ●●●●● Self-hostable (local worker) | ●●●●● Self-hostable |
Model freedom Whether you can point it at any provider, or it is wired to one. | ●●●●● Bring-your-key (many providers) | ●●●●● Bring-your-key |
Setup ease What it takes to get a first useful run out of it. | ●●●●● One-command install | ●●●●● One-command start |
Which one to pick
Pick claude-mem if…
Easy setup — one-command installer and a local worker that preserves and injects compressed session context into future Claude Code sessions.
Pick headroom if…
Easy setup — wrap agents or run a local proxy in one command to get large token savings, reversible originals, and shared memory across agents without code changes.
What people want from each one
thedotmack/claude-mem
Hacker News: Claude-Mem drew 2 points and 1 comments.
- v13.24.0 ships the 13.23.1 bundle: manifest/worker version mismatch makes the hook kill the worker on every event 👍 5
- [plan-14] Child Process Ownership — every process the worker spawns dies with the worker 👍 2
- Unexpectedly high API cost: claude-mem adds ~64% on top of my actual coding model spend 👍 2
headroomlabs-ai/headroom
Hacker News: Headroom – The context compression layer for AI agents drew 3 points and 0 comments.
Questions people ask
Is claude-mem better than headroom?
Neither one leads on the six capability axes, so the choice comes down to which of them fits the way you already work. claude-mem is worth picking when easy setup — one-command installer and a local worker that preserves and injects compressed session context into future Claude Code sessions.
Which of claude-mem and headroom keeps my code private?
claude-mem: Self-hostable (local worker) (4/5). headroom: Self-hostable (4/5).
What does each one cost to run?
claude-mem: Your API key for model calls; optional cloud backup to cmem.ai. headroom: Local software is free; LLM calls use your API key..
Full profiles: thedotmack/claude-mem and headroomlabs-ai/headroom. Everything else in Memory & context.