Hermes Agent desktop app: install, features and limits

What the desktop app is

Hermes Desktop is a native app for Mac and Windows. It is free and open source under the MIT licence, like the rest of Hermes Agent, and it lives in the main Hermes Agent repository rather than as a separate product. Its own description puts it simply: same agent, same skills, same memory as the command-line version. The app itself costs nothing; what you pay depends on the AI provider and any other services you connect.

What you get in the window:

• Chat that streams as it goes, with the agent’s tool use shown live.
• Several conversations at once, in tabs and side-by-side panes.
• A file browser and previews of what the agent produces.
• Voice: talk to it and hear the answer read back.
• Settings for your AI provider, model, tools and keys, all inside the app.
• Scheduled jobs, MCP server connections, plugins and chat-app setup.
• Built-in updates.

Which computers it installs on

• Mac: an installer for macOS 12 or later on Apple Silicon (M1 and newer). The installer refuses Intel Macs; on those you install the command-line version first and then run hermes desktop, which builds and opens the app.
• Windows: an installer for Windows 10 and 11.
• Linux: no ready-made installer at the moment. Install the command-line version and run hermes desktop.

Installers come from the downloads section of the official Hermes Agent website, not from the GitHub releases page, which carries no app files. The packaged app bundles its own Python, so you do not install that yourself.

The limit that matters: your laptop has to be on

Out of the box, the app starts and manages its own copy of Hermes on the same computer. That is simple, and the agent’s memory and settings stay on your machine (the AI provider you connect still receives what you send it). But it means the agent only works while that computer is awake. For a personal helper that you open when you need it, this is fine.

For business jobs it is usually the deciding factor. A morning summary scheduled for 7am does not run if the laptop is closed. A customer who messages your agent on Telegram or WhatsApp at night gets no answer while it sleeps. Jobs that are meant to happen while you are away need an agent that stays on.

The app has an answer for this: in Settings, under Gateways, you can switch the connection from the local copy to a Hermes backend running on another machine, such as a rented server or a home computer that never sleeps, or to Nous Research’s own Hermes Cloud. Running that backend yourself means a server to keep updated, and the Hermes docs are blunt about the risk: the backend reads and writes your API keys and can run commands, so a password-protected backend should “never” be exposed directly to the open internet. Plan on a private network; the docs use Tailscale as their example.

Desktop app or hosted agent?

The desktop app suits you if:

• you mainly chat with the agent while you are at your computer,
• you want the agent itself, with its memory and files, on your own machine,
• you are happy to pick and pay for an AI provider yourself.

A hosted agent suits you if:

• it should answer customers or run scheduled jobs while your laptop is shut,
• you want to reach it from your phone through Telegram, WhatsApp or another chat app,
• you would rather not run or secure a server.

You can also use both: the app for hands-on sessions at a desk, and an always-on agent for everything that should happen without them.

How ReadyHermes fits

ReadyHermes is the hosted side of that choice. Your own Hermes Agent runs on our servers around the clock, with AI included, and you use it from a browser workspace or from chat apps such as Telegram and WhatsApp. ReadyHermes does not connect to the Hermes Desktop app today, so treat the two as separate setups rather than one agent in two windows.

Two features in the workspace are easy to confuse with the app:

• Desktop (under Bot tools) shows your hosted agent’s own screen, live: the browser and apps it is using, so you can watch it work and take over when it needs a hand. It is not the Hermes Desktop app.
• My computer lets your hosted agent work with folders on your own computer. You choose exactly which folders, read only or read and write, and whether it may run commands there.

New to Hermes? Read what Hermes Agent is, or compare running it yourself with managed hosting.