# Alternatives to Dust > Source: https://theagentsindex.com/dust/alternatives (current datasheets, evidence-ranked) Candidates share the baseline category or are previously researched peers. Requirements, preserved strengths, explicit trade-offs and research coverage decide the order; paid tier does not. ## Shortlist ### 1. Glean Enterprise AI platform for building, governing and running agents on permission-aware company context. **Research coverage:** 35/35 criteria **Where it improves on Dust:** - [Writes code: yes — Code Writer proposes code changes and opens draft pull requests in GitHub, callable from Glean, agents or Slack.](https://docs.glean.com/administration/assistant/features/code-writer) - [Debugs and fixes: yes — Vendor names bug fixes as a target task; the Resolve Jira ticket agent turns an issue into a review-ready PR.](https://docs.glean.com/administration/assistant/features/code-writer) - [In your editor: yes — A remote MCP server puts Glean inside Cursor, VS Code, Windsurf, JetBrains AI Assistant and Claude Desktop.](https://www.glean.com/platform/api) **Trade-offs against Dust:** - [On the command line: partial — No Glean CLI of its own; a plug-in exposes Glean tools inside terminal coding agents such as Claude Code, Codex, Gemini CLI and OpenCode.](https://docs.glean.com/administration/platform/mcp/glean-plugin) - [Open source: no — Closed, vendor-operated system: even in the customer's own cloud, altering or patching Glean services is unsupported.](https://docs.glean.com/get-started/prepare/about-deployment) - [Free tier: no — Licensed per user per month with an upfront usage commit; every call to action on the site is a demo request, and no self-serve or free tier is published.](https://docs.glean.com/glean-core-suite-pricing) [View Glean](https://theagentsindex.com/glean) ### 2. Sim Open-source AI workspace for building, deploying and running agents across 1,000+ integrations. **Research coverage:** 35/35 criteria **Where it improves on Dust:** - [Whole-codebase work: yes — Create PR clones the whole repository into a sandbox with full read, shell, edit and git access.](https://docs.sim.ai/workflows/blocks/pi) - [Agent permissions: yes — A Human in the Loop block pauses a run indefinitely for approval; Enterprise permission groups block disallowed models and block types mid-execution.](https://docs.sim.ai/workflows/blocks/human-in-the-loop) - [Self-hosted: yes — Docker Compose and Kubernetes deployments are documented and free; the pricing table nevertheless lists 'Self Hosting' only under Enterprise.](https://docs.sim.ai/introduction) **Trade-offs against Dust:** - [Admin controls: partial — Enterprise Access Control groups restrict which model providers and block types users may run, enforced in the executor; not available below Enterprise.](https://docs.sim.ai/platform/enterprise/access-control) - [Single sign-on: partial — Both OIDC and SAML 2.0, with a verified email domain required; the plan table marks SSO available on Enterprise only.](https://docs.sim.ai/platform/enterprise/sso) - [Opt out of training: partial — No customer-facing training opt-out switch; the vendor commits that Google-API data is never used for generalized model training, and self-hosting keeps data on your own infrastructure.](https://www.sim.ai/privacy) [View Sim](https://theagentsindex.com/sim) ### 3. Agno Python SDK, open-source AgentOS runtime and hosted control plane for building and operating agents. **Research coverage:** 35/35 criteria **Where it improves on Dust:** - [Writes code: yes — Ships a CodingTools toolkit whose documented job is editing files and running commands in a scoped project directory.](https://docs.agno.com/use-cases/coding-agents) - [Debugs and fixes: yes — Bug fixing is a documented pattern: reproduce, patch, rerun the failing tests.](https://docs.agno.com/use-cases/coding-agents) - [In your editor: yes — `agno connect` writes MCP config for Claude Code, Claude Desktop, Codex and Cursor so those clients can run your agents.](https://docs.agno.com/cli/connect) **Trade-offs against Dust:** - [In your pipeline: no — The enumerated serving surfaces are REST, MCP in Claude/ChatGPT and chat apps; no pull-request or CI surface appears.](https://www.agno.com/) - [Open source: partial — SDK and AgentOS are Apache 2.0; the control plane is the commercial part and is not published as source.](https://www.agno.com/compare/agno-vs-langgraph) - [Pooled budget: partial — There is no metered balance to pool; seats share access to the same connected runtimes and usage inside a connection is unlimited.](https://www.agno.com/pricing) [View Agno](https://theagentsindex.com/agno) ### 4. Salesforce Agentforce Salesforce's platform for building, deploying and monitoring AI agents on top of CRM data. **Research coverage:** 35/35 criteria **Where it improves on Dust:** - [Writes code: yes — The Agentforce Vibes coding agent turns a natural-language description into Salesforce code and metadata.](https://www.salesforce.com/agentforce/developers/vibe-coding/) - [Debugs and fixes: yes — Vibes runs the test or deployment, reads the failure and iterates toward a fix rather than stopping at the error.](https://developer.salesforce.com/docs/platform/agentforcevibes/guide/afv-agentic-dev.html) - [Done-for-you service: partial — Agentforce is software the customer configures in a low-code builder; Salesforce separately sells Professional Services that performs the hands-on build, reached through an account executive rather than bundled with the product.](https://www.salesforce.com/services/professional-services/) **Trade-offs against Dust:** - [Reviews code: partial — Static analysis with auto-fix runs over code in your own workspace and Git diffs can be attached as context, but no diff or pull-request review feature is documented and the docs state the trust layers do not replace code review.](https://www.salesforce.com/agentforce/developers/vibe-coding/) - [Open models: partial — The Salesforce-managed model list names only Anthropic, OpenAI/Azure OpenAI, Google Vertex, Amazon and NVIDIA (beta), with no Llama or Mistral, so open-weight models arrive only through the customer's own BYOLLM connection.](https://developer.salesforce.com/docs/ai/agentforce/guide/supported-models.html) - [On the command line: partial — Salesforce CLI drives the whole agent lifecycle from a terminal, but the Vibes coding agent itself is distributed only as a VS Code extension and a hosted IDE. There is no standalone Vibes CLI.](https://developer.salesforce.com/docs/ai/agentforce/guide/headless-tools.html) [View Salesforce Agentforce](https://theagentsindex.com/salesforce-agentforce) ### 5. n8n Workflow automation platform for building and running AI agents on a visual canvas, with code where needed. **Research coverage:** 35/35 criteria **Where it improves on Dust:** - [Agent permissions: yes — Approval is wired per tool: the workflow pauses and a reviewer approves or denies through Chat, Slack, Discord, Telegram, Gmail or Outlook. Tools with no review step execute unattended.](https://docs.n8n.io/build/integrate-ai/ai-examples/human-in-the-loop-for-tools) - [In your pipeline: yes — Git source control with workflow diffs gates what reaches production, the n8n CLI page names CI/CD pipeline integration as a fit, and the GitHub Trigger node fires on pull request events.](https://n8n.io/enterprise/) - [Self-hosted: yes — Docker, npm or Helm on your own boxes, air-gapped if required; the free Community edition needs no licence key, and Business or Enterprise features unlock with one.](https://n8n.io/) **Trade-offs against Dust:** - [Reviews code: no — The review feature is a human approving a pinned workflow version against a visual diff (Enterprise, Preview); nothing in the product reviews a diff for you.](https://docs.n8n.io/build/manage-workflows/workflow-reviews) - [Open source: partial — Source-available under the fair-code Sustainable Use License: free to use, modify and redistribute for internal business purposes, but not to resell or host for others. Files named .ee. sit under a separate enterprise licence.](https://docs.n8n.io/privacy-and-security/sustainable-use-license) - [Seat model: no — Not sold per seat. Users are unlimited on every plan and the quota is executions, so there is no seat floor or ceiling to negotiate; shared projects are what step up by tier (1, 3, 6, unlimited).](https://n8n.io/pricing/) [View n8n](https://theagentsindex.com/n8n) ### 6. OpenClaw Self-hosted gateway that connects chat apps like WhatsApp, Telegram and Slack to AI agents on your own machine. **Research coverage:** 32/35 criteria **Where it improves on Dust:** - [Writes code: yes — The bundled agent runtime gets read, write, edit and apply_patch file tools plus exec, and the docs position the Gateway as a front end for coding agents.](https://docs.openclaw.ai/) - [In your editor: yes — An Agent Client Protocol bridge over stdio lets an IDE drive a Gateway session; the docs give Zed setup steps for it.](https://docs.openclaw.ai/cli/acp) - [Self-hosted: yes — Self-hosting is the only deployment model: one Gateway process on your laptop, a Mac mini, a VPS, Docker, Kubernetes or a Raspberry Pi.](https://docs.openclaw.ai/) **Trade-offs against Dust:** - [Reviews code: partial — No built-in review product; the vendor's showcase describes a community-built loop in which OpenClaw reads a PR diff and answers with suggestions and a merge verdict.](https://docs.openclaw.ai/start/showcase) - [Single sign-on: partial — No SAML or OIDC in the Gateway itself: it consumes a verified identity header from an identity-aware reverse proxy such as Cloudflare Access, or a Tailscale identity, and the security audit flags that delegation as critical.](https://docs.openclaw.ai/gateway/trusted-proxy-auth) - [Opt out of training: partial — There is no OpenClaw cloud in the path, so nothing trains on your data by default; whether your code trains a model depends on the provider you configure, and local providers avoid the question entirely.](https://openclaw.ai/privacy) [View OpenClaw](https://theagentsindex.com/openclaw) ## Method Unknown data is never treated as a benefit or a trade-off. Featured placement is labelled but cannot alter recommendation order.