CopilotKit vs deepseek-harness
deepseek-harness is much bigger: 223.4k stars against 37.3k. Over the days we have tracked them CopilotKit moved +6.2% and deepseek-harness +109.9%, so deepseek-harness is growing faster right now.
They split the axes: CopilotKit leads on noise control and model freedom, deepseek-harness on customization.
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
Provides a multi-platform generative UI and shared-state SDK that lets the same agent run across web, mobile, and chat via the AG-UI Protocol.
- Stars
- 37.3k
- Tracked growth
- +6.2%
- Maturity
- ●●●●●
- Last commit
- 27m ago
- Language
- TypeScript
- License
- MIT
- Cost to run
- Your LLM API key (third‑party); optional CopilotKit Cloud (separate pricing).
A plugin-first agent harness where every component is a plugin, enabling highly composable agent workflows.
- Stars
- 223.4k
- Tracked growth
- +109.9%
- Maturity
- ●●●●●
- Last commit
- 3d ago
- Language
- TypeScript
- License
- MIT
- Cost to run
- Free, self-hosted
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 | CopilotKit | deepseek-harness |
|---|---|---|
Context depth How much of your codebase it sees before it answers: the open diff, the diff plus related files, or the whole repository. | ●●●●● File-level context | ●●●●● Diff only |
Noise control How it keeps output volume down — severity thresholds, deduplication, incremental runs over new commits only. | ●●●●● Human-in-the-loop | ●●●●● No controls |
Customization How far it bends to your team: custom rules, prompts, style guides, per-path config. | ●●●●● Configurable skills & hooks | ●●●●● Plugin-based |
Privacy Whether your code stays on your own infrastructure: fully local, self-hostable, or cloud API only. | ●●●●● Self-hostable (cloud optional) | ●●●●● Self-hostable |
Model freedom Whether you can point it at any provider, or it is wired to one. | ●●●●● Bring-your-own key | ●●●●● Fixed provider only |
Setup ease What it takes to get a first useful run out of it. | ●●●●● One-command quickstart | ●●●●● One-command start |
Which one to pick
Pick CopilotKit if…
Easy setup — get an agent-powered generative UI in minutes with npx create and plug in your LLM key to deploy across web, mobile, and chat.
- Noise control: Human-in-the-loop (3/5 against 1/5)
- Model freedom: Bring-your-own key (5/5 against 1/5)
Pick deepseek-harness if…
Extensible plugin architecture — pick this when you want a locally runnable, highly modular agent harness you can extend with custom plugins.
- Customization: Plugin-based (5/5 against 3/5)
What people want from each one
CopilotKit/CopilotKit
Hacker News: Show HN: CopilotKit- Build in-app AI chatbots and AI-powered textareas drew 197 points and 67 comments.
Questions people ask
Is CopilotKit better than deepseek-harness?
They split the axes: CopilotKit leads on noise control and model freedom, deepseek-harness on customization. CopilotKit is worth picking when easy setup — get an agent-powered generative UI in minutes with npx create and plug in your LLM key to deploy across web, mobile, and chat.
Which of CopilotKit and deepseek-harness keeps my code private?
CopilotKit: Self-hostable (cloud optional) (4/5). deepseek-harness: Self-hostable (4/5).
What does each one cost to run?
CopilotKit: Your LLM API key (third‑party); optional CopilotKit Cloud (separate pricing).. deepseek-harness: Free, self-hosted.
Full profiles: CopilotKit/CopilotKit and deepseek-ai/deepseek-harness. Everything else in Agent SDKs & frameworks.