The best UI for Hermes Agent, in my own daily use, is my Agent OS, which is the dashboard I built to run Hermes, Claude and my other agents from one screen.
That is my own product, so weigh that when you read this ranking.
Hermes Desktop is my second pick and the best free one, and Herald OS is third because it is the best-looking Hermes front-end I have used.
Below, I rank seven interfaces and give you the setup route for each one, so you can go from nothing to a first chat today.
Top 3 Picks At A Glance
- 🥇 Agent OS is the best UI for Hermes Agent for my own work, because it puts Hermes, Claude and my other agents in one dashboard with one memory, and it is my own product inside the AI Profit Boardroom.
- 🥈 Hermes Desktop is the best free pick, because it is the official app from Nous Research and it runs on Mac, Windows and Linux.
- 🥉 Herald OS is the best-looking Hermes interface, although it is still an alpha from an independent developer.
What A UI For Hermes Agent Actually Is
Hermes Agent is the free, open-source AI agent from Nous Research, and it started life in the terminal.
A UI for Hermes Agent is any front-end that sits on top of that same agent, so you can chat, hand out jobs and watch the work without typing commands.
The official docs say the front-ends all talk to the same agent and share state, which means a session you start in one can be resumed in another.
That matters for this list, because picking one interface does not lock you out of the others.
I run several of them on the same machine, and my automations showed up in Herald OS, Hermes Desktop and my Agent OS without extra work.
Why This Ranking Differs From My Earlier One
I already published my earlier ranking of the free Hermes UIs, and it puts Hermes Desktop first and Herald OS second.
In that list I left my own Agent OS unranked, because the list was about free downloads and the Agent OS is mine.
This list answers a slightly different question, which is what I actually open every morning.
The honest answer to that question is my Agent OS, so it would be odd to hide it.
Nothing else has changed, because Hermes Desktop is still the best free pick and Herald OS is still the prettiest.
If you want a free interface today, skip to number two and you will lose nothing.
How I Ranked The Best UI For Hermes Agent
I ranked each interface on four things that matter when you operate agents every day.
The first is how much of my day I actually spend in it.
The second is how quickly a new operator can install it and reach a first chat.
The third is how much of Hermes you can control from it without the terminal.
The fourth is how stable it felt on my machine.
I have not measured any of this with a benchmark, so please treat the order as my honest operator opinion.
One entry, Hermes3D, is on the list from its documentation only, and I say so clearly in its section.
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The 7 Best UI Options For Hermes Agent, With Setup Steps
1. Agent OS (My Own Product)
The Agent OS is my AI agent operating system, which means one local dashboard where all my agents live and share one memory.
The home page is Mission Control, and it shows the live status of every agent, what is running and what happened since I last looked.
Every agent is a page in the same app, and each one gets a chat panel, a file workspace and a control room.
Mine has seven agents wired in, which are Claude Code, OpenClaw, Hermes, Antigravity, Codex, Gemini and Free Claude Code.
Hermes gets the most space, because one Hermes sits behind thirteen rooms called Chat, Apollo voice, Oracle, Astros, Studio, Sessions, Outreach, Mixture, Workspace, MCPs, Manage, Control Room and Goal Mode.
I can type in the chat, say "hey Hermes" out loud or drop a ticket on the kanban board, and it is the same agent with the same memory each time.
Spoken questions come back in about five seconds, and the answer is written into the same chat thread.
Every exchange saves itself into my Obsidian vault, which is the shared memory that Claude and the other agents read too.
Cost: It is included with AI Profit Boardroom membership, it is not a free download, and it is not on public GitHub.
Setup route: You join the AI Profit Boardroom, download the Agent OS zip, and follow the install video.
You install Hermes Agent first, and the OS then reads your Hermes profiles folder on its own and shows each profile as a chip in the chat.
You tap the ear icon once to arm the wake word, and it re-arms itself on every visit after that.
You light up the ticket room by creating a board with one command.
hermes kanban boards create my-builds
Best for: It suits operators who run Hermes next to Claude or other agents and are tired of juggling tabs.
Limits: It is my own product, it needs a membership, and it runs on your own machine, so your home internet and power decide whether you can reach it remotely.
If you would rather build your own for free, my Agent OS build guide gives you the seven prompts in order.
I explain why there is no public repo in my post on the Agent OS and GitHub.
2. Hermes Desktop (Official And Free)
Hermes Desktop is the native app from Nous Research, and it uses the same agent core, config, API keys, sessions, skills and memory as the command line.
It gives you chat with streaming tool output, a side-by-side preview rail, a file browser, voice, cron, profiles, skills and settings.
It also has a plugin marketplace, where I found around 500 free community plugins with a one-click install.
Cost: It is free and open source.
Setup route: If you already have Hermes, you run one command.
hermes desktop
If you are starting from nothing, you download the installer from the Hermes Desktop page for macOS on Apple Silicon, Windows or Linux.
Best for: It suits anyone who wants a stable daily driver with no terminal and no membership.
Limits: Voice permissions were hit and miss on my Mac when I tested them in June, and it only runs Hermes, so my other agents still lived in other windows.
3. Herald OS
Herald OS is an agent-native operating system with Hermes Agent as the interface, built by an independent developer called Luke The Dev.
It opens on a dashboard that greets you, shows today's schedule and offers a "Pick up where you left off" card.
It has Spaces for Ideas, Work and Personal, plus Missions, Memory, Files and Automations.
Honestly, I think it looks nicer than Hermes Desktop.
Cost: It is free and MIT licensed, and it is not an official Nous Research product.
Setup route: On a Mac you need macOS 13 or later on Apple Silicon, and you install Hermes Agent first.
curl -fsSL https://hermes-agent.nousresearch.com/install.sh | bash
hermes setup
Then you download the Mac build from the Herald OS releases page and drag it into Applications.
The build is not notarised by Apple yet, so you run this once before opening it.
xattr -dr com.apple.quarantine "/Applications/Herald OS.app"
Best for: It suits people who want a beautiful full-screen interface for Hermes alone.
Limits: It is an alpha, the top of the UI was slightly cut off on my screen, and the Connections page did not sync for me.
My full walkthrough is in my Herald OS setup guide.
4. Hermes WebUI
Hermes WebUI is a community web app by nesquena that gives you Hermes in a browser with close to full parity with the command line.
It has sessions on the left, chat in the middle and a workspace file browser on the right.
It is built with Python and plain JavaScript, so there is no build step.
Cost: It is free and MIT licensed.
Setup route: The project's quick start is three lines.
git clone https://github.com/nesquena/hermes-webui.git hermes-webui
cd hermes-webui
python3 bootstrap.py
You then reach it from another device through an SSH tunnel or Tailscale.
Best for: It suits operators who run Hermes on a server and want it on a laptop and a phone.
Limits: It is a separate project to keep updated, and you must secure remote access yourself.
5. Hermes Workspace
Hermes Workspace is a community command centre by outsourc-e that puts chat, files, memory, skills and a terminal in one browser app.
Version 2 added profiles, a kanban task board, a live inspector and a visual memory browser, and I have used the kanban board as an AI to-do list.
Cost: It is free and MIT licensed.
Setup route: The project offers a one-line installer, and it needs Node 22 or later.
curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/outsourc-e/hermes-workspace/main/install.sh | bash
hermes gateway run
cd ~/hermes-workspace && pnpm dev
You run the gateway in one terminal and the workspace in another, then open localhost on port 3000.
Best for: It suits people who want a free board and an inspector for several Hermes agents.
Limits: It has more moving parts than the others, because it needs the gateway and the dashboard running behind it.
6. The Terminal And The TUI
The terminal is where Hermes started, and it is still the fastest interface once you know it.
Cost: It is free, because it ships with Hermes.
Setup route: You run hermes for the classic interface or the command below for the modern terminal UI, which the docs call the recommended way to run Hermes interactively.
hermes --tui
Best for: It suits developers and anyone working on a remote server.
Limits: It is the least friendly option for beginners, and it is the reason every other tool on this list exists.
7. Hermes3D (Unofficial, And I Have Not Tested It)
Hermes3D is a 3D virtual office for AI agents that you run on your own infrastructure, built by LukeTheDev, who also makes Herald OS.
I have not installed it, so everything in this section comes from its GitHub README and not from my own testing.
The README says it is an independent, community-driven front-end that is not affiliated with the teams behind the agent backends it connects to, so it is not made by Nous Research.
It describes a live 3D office where you watch agents work, run standups, review pull requests and chat with a fleet, plus a 2D pixel office for low-power machines.
Cost: It is free and MIT licensed.
Setup route: The README asks for Node.js 20 or later, and Hermes3D does not install Hermes for you.
git clone https://github.com/iamlukethedev/Hermes3D hermes3d
cd hermes3d
npm install
cp .env.example .env
npm run dev
You then open localhost on port 3000 and set the gateway URL and token, and npm run hermes-adapter starts the bundled Hermes adapter.
Best for: It may suit people who want to see a team of agents as an office, once they have tested it themselves.
Limits: It has one release from August 2026 and no pushes since late August, so check the repo for activity before you rely on it.
My docs-based explainer is in the Hermes3D guide.
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Best UI For Hermes Agent: Compared At A Glance
| Rank | UI | Type | Cost | Setup route | Best for |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Agent OS | Multi-agent dashboard (my own product) | Included with AI Profit Boardroom membership | Download the zip and follow the install video | Hermes plus Claude and other agents in one place |
| 2 | Hermes Desktop | Official native app | Free | hermes desktop or the installer |
Most people starting free |
| 3 | Herald OS | Full-screen agent OS | Free, alpha | Releases page, after installing Hermes | The nicest look |
| 4 | Hermes WebUI | Browser app | Free | Clone, then python3 bootstrap.py |
Browser and phone |
| 5 | Hermes Workspace | Browser command centre | Free | One-line installer | Boards and inspection |
| 6 | Terminal and TUI | Command line | Free | hermes --tui |
Developers and servers |
| 7 | Hermes3D | Unofficial 3D office (untested by me) | Free | Clone, then npm run dev |
Watching a team of agents |
The Setup Order I Recommend For Operators
You don't need all seven, and installing everything at once is the fastest way to get confused.
Here is the order I'd follow on a fresh machine.
- Install Hermes Agent with the official script and run
hermes setupto choose a model. - Run
hermes --tuiand send one small test message, so you know the agent itself works. - Run
hermes desktopand use Hermes Desktop for your first week. - Run
hermes dashboardwhenever you need to change a key or check a cron job. - Try Herald OS if you want a nicer screen for Hermes alone.
- Move to an Agent OS when you add a second agent and the tab juggling starts.
If you want the base install explained slowly, my one-click Hermes setup guide covers it.
The built-in admin panel from step four gets its own roundup in my Hermes Agent dashboards guide.
How I Set Up Hermes Inside The Agent OS
This is the operator view of my number one pick, taken from my own live guides.
Step 1: Install Hermes First
The Agent OS is a dashboard and Hermes is the agent, so Hermes has to exist on the machine before the dashboard can find it.
Nous Research made the install a single click, and you then choose a model.
Step 2: Let The OS Find Your Profiles
Every profile in your Hermes profiles folder appears as a chip in the chat automatically.
Each chip is one persona with its own model, memory and rules.
I keep a row of them, and they range from free local models to the big frontier ones.
Step 3: Arm The Voice Door
The wake word listens in the browser itself, so you grant the microphone once.
I built it in the browser on purpose, because the command line wake word needs its own microphone permission on a Mac.
A good first test is to say "hey Hermes, what's on my board?" and listen for the answer.
Step 4: Turn Prompts Into Tickets
Bigger jobs become tickets on the kanban board instead of long prompts.
A dispatcher starts a Hermes worker for each ticket, and the worker drives the build while I do something else.
Three builds in my guide went from ticket to done that way, which were a landing page, a content kanban app and an analytics dashboard.
Step 5: Use The Manage Room For Admin
The full Hermes dashboard is embedded in the Manage room, so sessions, models, cron jobs and skills sit one click away.
That means I rarely open a terminal for settings.
Step 6: Add Phone Access With Tailscale
Tailscale is free, and it builds a private network that only your own devices can see.
You bookmark the private address on your phone, and the same board, chats and memory open in a layout built for your thumb.
On a Mac you must also stop the machine sleeping when the display is off, because that one setting decides whether remote access works at all.
First-Run Checks For Any Hermes UI
Every interface here depends on the same Hermes install underneath, so the same checks apply.
Make sure Hermes has a model provider, which can be a Nous Portal account or an API key for a provider such as OpenRouter, OpenAI or Anthropic.
Send one small test message before you give it a real job.
Look at the Memory page before you share your screen, because I once spotted my Telegram details sitting in mine.
Leave approval prompts switched on until you trust the setup.
Keep any browser-based interface on your own machine or on a private network such as Tailscale.
Common Problems And Quick Fixes
| Problem | What to try |
|---|---|
| The Agent OS shows no Hermes chips | Check that Hermes Agent is installed first, because the OS reads your Hermes profiles folder. |
| The wake word does not respond | Allow the microphone for the page in your browser, then tap the ear icon again. |
| The phone cannot reach the dashboard | Check that Tailscale is signed in on both devices and that the Mac is not asleep. |
| Herald OS will not open on a Mac | Run the xattr command above once, then open it from Applications. |
| Hermes Workspace cannot find the agent | Make sure hermes gateway run and hermes dashboard are both running. |
| Hermes3D cannot connect | Check the gateway URL and token in the README, and start the Hermes adapter first. |
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Which UI For Hermes Agent Should You Pick?
Pick the Agent OS if you run Hermes alongside Claude or other agents and you want one screen and one memory.
Pick Hermes Desktop if you want one free, stable app and no drama.
Pick Herald OS if looks matter to you and you're happy to live with alpha rough edges.
Pick Hermes WebUI if your agent lives on a server.
Pick Hermes Workspace if you love a kanban board and want it free.
Pick the terminal for speed, and treat Hermes3D as an experiment until you have tested it.
Related Reading
- My earlier ranking of the free Hermes UIs covers nine free front-ends, including Pixel Office, StarNet and Hermes Cloud.
- My Herald OS setup guide tours every page and setting of my third pick.
- The Hermes Agent dashboards roundup shows which dashboard displays sessions, costs, tasks and memory.
- The Hermes3D guide explains the 3D office from its documentation.
- The best Hermes Agent setup covers the full stack around the interface.
Also On Our Network
- 🌐 How a business, an agency or a creator uses each Hermes interface
- 🌐 Seven Hermes interfaces reviewed feature by feature, with a verdict
- 🌐 A quick-start for running Hermes inside an Agent OS
- 🌐 The models to run behind your Hermes UI, with real bench scores
FAQ: Best UI For Hermes Agent
What is the best UI for Hermes Agent?
The UI I use every day is my own Agent OS, and I'm telling you plainly that it is my own product.
The best free UI for Hermes Agent is Hermes Desktop, the official app from Nous Research.
Is the Agent OS free or on GitHub?
No, the Agent OS is not on public GitHub.
Members of the AI Profit Boardroom download it as an installable zip, and my free guide shows the prompts to build your own.
What is the fastest free UI for Hermes Agent to set up?
You run hermes desktop if Hermes is already installed.
It launches against your existing install, so your config, keys, sessions and memory are already there.
Why does this ranking differ from your best Hermes Agent UI list?
That list ranks the free downloads, and I left my own Agent OS out of it.
This list ranks what I open every day, so the Agent OS is first and Hermes Desktop is still the top free pick.
Is Hermes3D an official Hermes Agent UI?
No, Hermes3D is an independent community project by LukeTheDev.
I have not tested it, so my notes come from its README.
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About Julian
I'm Julian Goldie, an SEO entrepreneur, author and founder of the AI Profit Boardroom, which has 3,400+ members.
I help business owners scale with AI agents, automation and SEO.
- I've built Goldie Agency into a seven-figure SEO and link building agency.
- I've grown my YouTube channel to 400,000+ subscribers.
- I run my own Agent OS with Hermes, Claude and other agents under one shared memory.
- I wrote "Link Building Mastery".
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Start with Hermes Desktop for free, move to an Agent OS when you add a second agent, and you will have the best UI for Hermes Agent for the way you work.
