AgentTeams
An open-source Collaborative Multi-Agent OS for transparent, human-in-the-loop task coordination via Matrix rooms.
The Lens
By Erik Loyd, SaaS CEO and former COO/CFO of an AWS Premier Partner.
Updated Oct 2026
AgentTeams, formerly HiClaw, runs a team of AI agents inside chat rooms you can read. A Manager agent creates Workers and hands out tasks in Matrix rooms (the open chat protocol behind Element) where you can watch and jump in. Alibaba's AgentScope team publishes it under Apache 2.0, free to self-host.
One curl | bash installer stands up the whole stack in Docker: AI gateway, bundled Matrix server, MinIO, Element Web and the Manager. Plan on 2 CPU cores and 4 GB of RAM minimum, plus your own LLM API key. Workers can run OpenClaw, QwenPaw, Hermes or an experimental DeepSeek harness, and a Helm chart covers Kubernetes.
The selling point: Workers only hold a consumer token while the gateway keeps your real API keys. Alibaba Cloud also sells a managed version in public beta, metered by managed time and task time, with no public rate card. Solo: overkill. Small teams: free if someone owns the Docker host. Alibaba Cloud shops: try managed.
The catch: lots of moving parts, and it renamed itself mid-flight with breaking changes to its Kubernetes resources and installer. Images pull from Alibaba Cloud registries. CrewAI or AutoGen are lighter if humans don't need to watch.
Free vs Self-Hosted vs Paid
free self hosted paid cloudFree: The full platform under Apache 2.0: Manager, Workers, Higress AI gateway, bundled Matrix server (Tuwunel), MinIO shared storage, Element Web and the optional Dashboard. No feature gates in the open source repo.
Self-hosted: One-line installer on Docker (2 CPU cores and 4 GB RAM minimum, 4 cores and 8 GB recommended for multiple Workers) or the Helm chart on Kubernetes 1.24+. You bring an OpenAI-compatible LLM API key, and token spend is your main running cost.
Paid: Alibaba Cloud runs a managed AgentTeams service in public beta, billed by managed duration and task duration with token monitoring and quota alerts. No unit prices are published on the product page.
Free to self-host; your real cost is the LLM tokens your Workers burn. Alibaba Cloud's managed version is metered by managed time and task time but publishes no rates yet.
What to do by team size
- Solo
- free, but overkill for one person's agents
- Small team
- free if someone owns the Docker host and the LLM bill
- Medium team
- free self-hosted on Kubernetes via Helm; audit trail in Matrix rooms
- Large team
- free self-hosted, or Alibaba Cloud's managed AgentTeams if you're already on Alibaba Cloud
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License: Apache License 2.0
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