OpenHands

OpenHands
DevelopersOpenHands community and All Hands AI
ReleaseMarch 12, 2024; 2 years ago (2024-03-12)
Written inTypeScript
Operating systemLinux, macOS, Windows via WSL
TypeAI coding agent
LicenseMIT License (core)
proprietary license (enterprise components)
Websitewww.openhands.dev
Repositorygithub.com/OpenHands/OpenHands

OpenHands, formerly known as OpenDevin, is an open-source artificial intelligence agent and platform for AI-assisted software development. It uses large language models to perform software-engineering tasks such as modifying source code, executing commands, browsing the web and interacting with development tools. OpenHands is model-agnostic and can be configured to use different cloud-hosted or locally hosted language models.

History

U+1F64C 🙌 PERSON RAISING BOTH HANDS IN CELEBRATION emoji

The project began on March 12, 2024, under the name OpenDevin. It was created as an independent open-source project inspired by Devin AI, a proprietary autonomous software-development agent introduced by Cognition AI. The project was renamed OpenHands in August 2024 as its developers expanded its scope beyond recreating Devin.

The name OpenHands was chosen to reflect both the project's welcoming community and the idea that software-development agents give users additional “hands” to perform tasks. The project uses the U+1F64C 🙌 PERSON RAISING BOTH HANDS IN CELEBRATION emoji in its branding.

Robert Brennan, Xingyao Wang and Graham Neubig subsequently founded All Hands AI to support the project's development. In September 2024, the company raised US$5 million in seed funding led by Menlo Ventures.

A research paper describing OpenHands was published in the proceedings of the 2025 International Conference on Learning Representations. The paper presented OpenHands as a platform for developing general-purpose agents capable of interacting with software environments and evaluated agents across software-engineering and web-browsing benchmarks.

Capabilities

OpenHands agents can edit files, generate and test code, execute command-line operations, browse websites and call application programming interfaces. Code execution can be isolated inside sandboxed environments to separate an agent's actions from the host operating system.

The platform includes a browser-based interface known as Agent Canvas, a software agent software development kit (SDK) and cloud-hosted deployment options. Agent Canvas can run OpenHands agents or connect to other compatible coding agents and can automate tasks initiated through services such as GitHub and Slack.

OpenHands can be deployed locally, on a remote server or through the OpenHands cloud service. Its SDK supports custom tools, persistent agent memory, multiple language models and execution across local and remote environments.

OpenHands can connect to OpenRouter through an API key, allowing users to configure the agent with language models available from multiple providers through a single interface.

OpenHands can be self-hosted using Docker on a local computer or cloud-based virtual machine. Its remote agent servers can also be deployed using Kubernetes, virtual machines, on-premises infrastructure or cloud services.

Use and concerns

In April 2025, Wired reported that an adviser working with the United States Department of Veterans Affairs had proposed using OpenHands to write code for the department. Employees cited by the publication raised concerns about giving an autonomous agent access to repositories containing sensitive systems and information without completing established security reviews.

See also

References

  1. 1 2 "One Year of OpenHands: A Journey of Open Source AI Development". OpenHands. March 17, 2025. Retrieved August 3, 2026.
  2. 1 2 "OpenHands". GitHub. Retrieved August 3, 2026.
  3. ↑ "Setup". OpenHands documentation. Retrieved August 3, 2026.
  4. 1 2 "Introduction". OpenHands documentation. Retrieved August 3, 2026.
  5. 1 2 3 "OpenHands: An Open Platform for AI Software Developers as Generalist Agents". International Conference on Learning Representations. 2025. Retrieved August 3, 2026.
  6. 1 2 3 Lardinois, Frederic (September 5, 2024). "All Hands AI raises $5M to build open source agents for developers". TechCrunch. Retrieved August 3, 2026.
  7. ↑ Williams, Carl (April 10, 2026). "Why You Need an Open Source Coding Agent". Tech Times. Retrieved August 3, 2026.
  8. ↑ Neubig, Graham. "OpenDevin renamed to OpenHands". LinkedIn. Retrieved August 3, 2026.
  9. ↑ "The OpenHands Software Agent SDK: A Composable and Extensible Foundation for Production Agents". arXiv. 2025. Retrieved August 3, 2026.
  10. ↑ "OpenRouter". OpenHands documentation. Retrieved August 3, 2026.
  11. ↑ Maheswaran, Melani (May 30, 2025). "Devstral: An Open-Source Agentic LLM for Software Engineering". DigitalOcean. Retrieved August 3, 2026.
  12. ↑ "Remote Agent Server overview". OpenHands documentation. Retrieved August 3, 2026.
  13. ↑ Elliott, Vittoria (April 4, 2025). "Inside DOGE's AI Push at the Department of Veterans Affairs". Wired. Retrieved August 3, 2026.