Last updated: October 17, 2026
Hermes Agent is Nous Research’s free, MIT-licensed AI agent. It runs on your own computer or server, with persistent memory, scheduled tasks and a messaging gateway. The current release is v0.22.2 (October 15, 2026). For a small office, the desktop app is now the sensible way in. Pair it with a cloud model unless you have a GPU workstation.
Where things stand
v0.22.0, “The Threshold Release,” landed October 13, 2026, and is the largest change to Hermes so far. New desktop installs open a guided setup chat that runs on a free trial model (nous/welcome, desktop first-install only, once per OS user). Signed desktop packages replace the old installers: an MSIX for Windows 11 22H2 or newer (x64 and ARM64, also in the Microsoft Store) and a notarized Apple Silicon build for macOS. Source installs now follow tested SemVer releases by default, and main is opt-in.
The patch cycle was rough. v0.22.1 (October 14) was built from the wrong commit, and v0.22.2 replaced it the next day. v0.22.2 fixes a gateway that could refuse to start after a reboot under systemd, launchd or Docker. It also improves long local-model turns on laptops.
Local models are now one click. Hermes bundles a llama.cpp runtime with CPU, CUDA, Metal, Vulkan and ROCm backends. Downloads pause and resume, and the model server starts and stops with Hermes. The catalog includes Qwen3.8 27B, Qwen3.8 Flash Next, Qwen3.6 35B-A3B, DeepSeek V4 Flash and any GGUF from Hugging Face. Hermes only recommends models that fit fully in GPU memory. The release notes put Qwen3.8 Flash Next at 128 GB machines, so plan hardware around the model, not the other way round. See Local AI: Models by Hardware Tier.
Connectors let the agent act in hosted apps such as Linear and Notion through the Nous tool gateway. You sign in once in a browser, and multiple named accounts are supported. The browser agent can now log in through 1Password, Bitwarden or Hermes’s encrypted vault without the model seeing the password. The messaging gateway covers Telegram, Discord, Slack, WhatsApp, Signal and email. A built-in web dashboard (hermes dashboard, port 9119) shows sessions, logs, cron jobs and config.
Adoption is large. Hermes Atlas counted 246,755 GitHub stars on September 18, 2026. Fast growth has also brought regressions: v0.21.0 and v0.21.1 had session-store bugs that marked healthy databases as corrupt, fixed in v0.21.2. v0.21.6 fixed dashboard security issues reported by Tenable Research, including a sign-in redirect that could allow session takeover.
| Install path | Best for | Cost (checked Oct 2026) | Runs where | Our take |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Hermes Desktop (Windows MSIX / Store) | A single staff PC | Free app; models extra | Local, Windows 11 22H2+ | Easiest start; Windows 10 machines are out |
| Hermes Desktop (macOS) | Mac users, Apple Silicon local models | Free app; models extra | Local, Apple Silicon only | Good pairing with Metal local models |
| CLI install script | Technical users on Linux, macOS, Windows | Free | Local or server | Now tracks stable releases by default |
| Gateway on a server (Docker, systemd) | Office bot in Slack, WhatsApp or email | Free plus hosting | Your server | Use v0.22.2 or later because of the reboot fix |
| Nous Portal models | Cloud models without separate API keys | Free tier; Plus $20, Super $100, Ultra $200/mo | Cloud | Simple billing; data leaves the building |
| One-click local models (llama.cpp) | Confidential drafts | Free; your hardware | Local | Only worthwhile with a real GPU |
What a small office should do now
If you want to try Hermes, install the desktop app on one machine, update to v0.22.2, and connect a cloud model you already pay for. Give it one recurring job, such as a morning summary of a shared inbox. Learn how memory and cron behave before you add the gateway.
Before upgrading an existing install, read the breaking changes. Auto-prune now deletes ended sessions inactive for 90 days (set sessions.auto_prune to false to keep everything). Chats no longer reset on idle timers. One gateway per machine is the new default. KittenTTS doesn’t work on the managed Python 3.14. Sessions that ran under the 0.22.1 gateway can’t be deleted in 0.22.2.
Don’t bother if no one in the office will read release notes. Hermes ships changes weekly, and a gateway exposed to the internet needs patching. A hosted agent inside your Claude or ChatGPT plan is the better fit in that case; compare options on Top AI Agents.
What we’re watching
- Whether the new stable channel produces calmer point releases after the v0.22.1 mix-up.
- A fix for undeletable sessions left by the 0.22.1 gateway.
- The project site still lists a macOS 12+ .dmg and a Windows 10/11 .exe, while the v0.22.0 notes say those installers were replaced. We’ll confirm which downloads are current.
- Paid pricing for the Nous tool gateway that powers Connectors.
Sources
- GitHub: NousResearch/hermes-agent releases (October 2026)
- Nous Research: Hermes Agent site (October 2026)
- ExplainX: Hermes Agent v0.22.0 Threshold Release (October 2026)
- Hermes Atlas: State of Hermes Agent (September 2026)
- Bitdoze: Best Hermes Agent dashboards (updated July 2026)
Changelog
- 2026-10-17 — Page created.