Armadai vs Agentastic: a free agent IDE and a paid canvas app for the Mac

Agentastic is a free native Mac IDE for coding agents. It runs 55 built-in agent definitions, isolates each one in a Git worktree or container, and can run agents on remote machines and cloud services. Armadai is a paid Mac app that puts several projects on one infinite canvas. It works with Claude Code, Codex, Grok and Cursor, and adds a master agent, approvals from a sidebar and task boards that hand work to an agent. If price, agent breadth or remote execution decide it, Agentastic is the stronger pick. Armadai is the alternative for people who want every project laid out side by side.

The comparison in one table

Agentastic costs nothing; Armadai is a subscription

Agentastic says its desktop app is free without limits, with no sign-up. You pay the agent vendors directly, as you would with any of these apps. An Agentastic account is needed only for its optional services, such as reaching your Mac from the iPhone app through Agentastic's servers.

Armadai has no free plan. It costs $20 a month, or $120 a year, which works out to $10 a month, and the annual plan has a 30-day money-back guarantee. The 7-day free trial needs no card and ends on its own unless you add one. Current plans are under pricing.

If you want to spend nothing beyond your agent subscriptions, choose Agentastic. Armadai only makes sense if its layout and workflow are worth a monthly fee to you.

Agentastic supports more agents by name

Agentastic ships 55 built-in agent definitions, including Claude Code, Codex, Cursor, Gemini CLI, GitHub Copilot, OpenCode, Amp, Goose and Aider. It finds the agents you have installed, accepts any terminal tool as a custom connection, and runs 31 of the agents as a structured chat, either natively or over ACP. Armadai's homepage names Claude Code, Codex, Grok and Cursor, and also has plain terminal tiles and a chat-style Codex Agent tile. If Gemini, Copilot or one of the smaller agents is part of your daily work, Agentastic supports it by name and Armadai's homepage does not name it.

Both keep parallel agents apart, in different ways

In Agentastic, every workspace is a new Git worktree, so each agent gets its own branch and working copy. You can also run an agent in an Apple container or a Docker container. A .agentastic/setup.sh hook runs when a worktree is created, which is where you copy .env files or set up a database.

In Armadai, each project folder is a workspace, and you run as many agents in it as you need. Worktrees come from the task board: when you choose Run with Claude or Run with Codex on a task, Armadai gives that run its own Git worktree and returns successful work as a draft pull request. The Codex Agent tile can also fork a conversation into a new worktree. For the general method with either app or neither, see running several Claude Code agents at once.

What Agentastic has that Armadai's homepage does not list

• Remote and cloud agents. Agents can run on any dev server over SSH, or on Modal, Fly and Vercel, in sessions that keep going after your Mac sleeps.
• Containers. Apple containers and Docker are both supported as an alternative to a plain worktree.
• Manager Agents. A manager is a persistent agent that runs for days or weeks. It does not edit code. It starts and steers ordinary agents against objectives you set, each of which can be checked by a test, a plugin query or a model's judgment.
• Agentic code review. A diff viewer with unified and side-by-side modes, plus review from Claude, Codex and CodeRabbit.
• A browser agents can drive. Agents can test your app in a built-in browser. In Design Mode, you click a page element to send its HTML, CSS and a cropped screenshot to the agent.
• Plugins. Slack, Notion, Sentry, GitHub and Linear are first-class plugins. Jira, GitLab, Bitbucket, Asana, Trello and several others are also supported.
• A standalone agent. Agentastic's own coding agent installs as a CLI on macOS, Linux or WSL.

What Armadai has that Agentastic's site does not list

• Several projects on one canvas. Each project folder becomes a workspace with its own agents, terminals, code, browser, notes and task board. You zoom out to see every project and zoom in to work on one. Agentastic's site does not describe a canvas view.
• A master agent you can point at your Mac. From one sidebar conversation, a Claude Code, Codex, Grok or Cursor master opens and creates workspaces, launches and messages agents, reads their replies and arranges the canvas. If you enable computer use and grant macOS permissions, it can also click, type and scroll in other apps.
• Approvals without leaving the canvas. The sidebar shows which sessions are working, idle or waiting across every project. You hover a waiting one and accept, accept for the session, decline or cancel without leaving your place on the canvas. The choices depend on the agent and the request, and some requests still need you to open the session. Agentastic gathers waiting requests too, in a Needs You filter and an Inbox in its iPhone app.
• Task boards that hand work to an agent. Boards come with backlog, table, calendar and dashboard views. A task's brief and definition of done go to Claude Code or Codex in its own worktree, and successful work comes back as a draft pull request. Agentastic starts work from a prompt, a spec or an issue from your issue tracker, and its Kanban board turns the resulting worktrees into cards grouped by label.
• Coordinate. Coordinate connects Claude Code and Codex in one project so they exchange plans, implementation and reviews. You approve or edit each message, or choose Auto, and you set a message budget.
• Environment Vault and terminal recording. Secret values are stored in macOS Keychain, and environment variables can be scoped to the app, a canvas or one workspace. Terminal output can optionally be recorded locally with a retention window.

What the two have in common

Both are native Mac apps for Apple Silicon and Intel Macs. Both put a code editor, terminals, Git tools and a browser beside the agents. Both use your own agent accounts and leave the provider's billing alone. Both have an iPhone app in beta on TestFlight. Agentastic's Companion needs iOS 18 or later and your Mac awake with Agentastic open, and it connects either directly or through Agentastic's servers. Both can keep agents working away from the main window: Agentastic through remote and cloud sessions, Armadai through an optional background session helper that keeps terminals and CLI agents running after you quit.

Which one to choose

Choose Agentastic if you want a free app, use agents beyond Claude Code, Codex, Grok and Cursor, want agents in containers or on remote machines, or want a long-running manager that works toward measurable objectives. It is also the better fit if your work runs through Slack, Linear or Sentry.

Choose Armadai if you work across several projects at once and want them on one canvas, want to answer most agent approvals from one sidebar without leaving the canvas, plan work on a board and hand tasks to Claude Code or Codex from it, or want Claude Code and Codex to work toward one goal through Coordinate. To compare it with other apps, Conductor alternatives covers worktree-per-task apps, and infinite canvas apps for coding agents covers the other canvas apps.