forkd vs herdr
herdr is much bigger: 35.4k stars against 2.8k. Over the days we have tracked them forkd moved +50.8% and herdr +54.7%, so herdr is growing faster right now.
herdr leads on customization and setup ease. forkd does not take any axis by a clear margin.
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 near-fork(2) microVM spawn and live BRANCHing via snapshot copy-on-write, enabling KVM-isolated agent fan-out with millisecond-scale latency.
- Stars
- 2.8k
- Tracked growth
- +50.8%
- Maturity
- ●●●●●
- Last commit
- 2d ago
- Language
- Rust
- License
- Apache-2.0
- Cost to run
- Free, self-hosted
A terminal-first agent multiplexer that runs as a single Rust binary with detachable sessions, tmux-style interaction, and a plugin marketplace.
- Stars
- 35.4k
- Tracked growth
- +54.7%
- Maturity
- ●●●●●
- Last commit
- 9h ago
- Language
- Rust
- License
- Apache-2.0
- Cost to run
- Free, local install
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 | forkd | herdr |
|---|---|---|
Context depth How much of your codebase it sees before it answers: the open diff, the diff plus related files, or the whole repository. | ●●●●● Diff only | ●●●●● No repo context |
Noise control How it keeps output volume down — severity thresholds, deduplication, incremental runs over new commits only. | ●●●●● None | ●●●●● None mentioned |
Customization How far it bends to your team: custom rules, prompts, style guides, per-path config. | ●●●●● CLI / REST options | ●●●●● Plugins & config |
Privacy Whether your code stays on your own infrastructure: fully local, self-hostable, or cloud API only. | ●●●●● Fully local | ●●●●● Runs fully local |
Model freedom Whether you can point it at any provider, or it is wired to one. | ●●●●● No model support | ●●●●● Other/unspecified |
Setup ease What it takes to get a first useful run out of it. | ●●●●● Kernel + root req | ●●●●● One-command start |
Which one to pick
Pick forkd if…
Ultra-fast fan-out — pick forkd when you need hundreds of warmed, KVM-isolated microVM sandboxes and the ability to snapshot/branch a running agent mid-thought.
Pick herdr if…
Local-first & easy setup — install one binary to run detachable, terminal-native agent sessions with plugin support and a socket API.
- Customization: Plugins & config (5/5 against 3/5)
- Setup ease: One-command start (5/5 against 2/5)
What people want from each one
deeplethe/forkd
Hacker News: Forkd: Fork() for AI Agent MicroVMs drew 2 points and 0 comments.
herdrdev/herdr
Questions people ask
Is forkd better than herdr?
herdr leads on customization and setup ease. forkd does not take any axis by a clear margin. forkd is worth picking when ultra-fast fan-out — pick forkd when you need hundreds of warmed, KVM-isolated microVM sandboxes and the ability to snapshot/branch a running agent mid-thought.
Which of forkd and herdr keeps my code private?
forkd: Fully local (5/5). herdr: Runs fully local (5/5).
What does each one cost to run?
forkd: Free, self-hosted. herdr: Free, local install.
Full profiles: deeplethe/forkd and herdrdev/herdr. Everything else in Runtimes & sandboxes.