Overview

OpenHands (formerly OpenDevin) is an open-source AI software development agent by All Hands AI that can write code, run commands, browse the web, and manage files to perform real engineering work. Give it a task and it plans, edits code, tests its changes, and iterates until the job is done — operating inside a sandboxed workspace rather than just suggesting snippets. It is built around a collaboration-first design: you review and steer its work continuously, keeping you in control of what ships.

Key Features

• Autonomous Agent Loop: Plans, writes, executes, and debugs code independently through a long-running feedback loop
• Sandboxed Environment: Every session runs in an isolated container so experiments and builds cannot damage your machine
• Web & CLI Integration: Can browse documentation, search the web, and run terminal commands as part of the task
• Multi-Model Support: Works with a range of LLMs including local models and major hosted providers
• Git & PR Workflow: Creates branches and pull requests, and can operate directly on GitHub issues
• UI + CLI + SDK: Use the web dashboard, the headless CLI, or embed it via the Python/Docker SDK
• Extensible Skills: Add custom skills and actions to specialise it for your codebase or workflow

Why Use It

OpenHands moves beyond tab-completion into delegated engineering. Instead of asking an assistant for a snippet and pasting it yourself, you describe a goal and OpenHands does the whole loop — editing, running tests, fixing failures — while you review each step. Its sandbox offers a safety advantage over tools that modify your working tree directly. For developers who want their stored knowledge on a reusable, inspectable agent, OpenHands is one of the most complete open-source options.

Use Cases

• Bug fixing: Point it at a failing test and let it trace, patch, and verify the solution
• Feature implementation: Describe a new module and review the code + tests it produces
• Codebase onboarding: Ask it to explore a repo, summarise architecture, and document entry points
• Automated issue triage: Wire it to GitHub issues for draft PRs and investigation reports

Platform

Linux, macOS; Docker required for the sandboxed runtime

Licence

MIT License (open source)

Website

all-hands.dev · github.com/All-Hands-AI/OpenHands