Rating certificate · AW/26-09/02226 Sept 2026
Not enough evidence
The Register / Orchestrators & meta-harnesses / Conductor
Register entry · Orchestrators & meta-harnesses · updated 26 Sept 2026
Conductor
Conductor is a macOS desktop app from Melty Labs that runs the first-party Claude Code, Codex, Cursor and OpenCode agents in parallel, each in its own git-worktree workspace with its own branch, terminal, diff and review path. A paid Conductor Cloud tier adds cloud workspaces on isolated sandboxes, multiplayer sharing, routines (scheduled or GitHub-triggered agent runs), an API and MCP access. The local app is free; users bring their own agent subscriptions or API keys. The company announced a $22M Series A in March 2026.
What reviewers and users praise
- Makes worktree setup/teardown and parallel agent review easy (Astrada, Eastman, HN users)
- Polished UI that became the daily workflow for many users (HN, r/conductorbuild)
- Very frequent releases with detailed public changelog
What they criticise
- macOS only; closed source (HN users, Eastman)
- Stability and regression complaints; high idle memory (r/conductorbuild)
- Users report faster usage-limit burn when running agents through Conductor (r/conductorbuild)
- Pro cloud features not yet compelling for some paying users (r/conductorbuild)
Experts vs the crowdneeds both scores
Experts—
Crowd55
| Price | Free, paid from $50 |
|---|---|
| Use it via | Desktop app, API, MCP server, CLI |
| Runs on | macos |
| Licence | proprietary |
| Updated | Evidence collected 26 Sept 2026 |
How the rating was worked out
Weights for Orchestrators & meta-harnesses: adoption 40%, experts 30%, crowd 30%. Fewer than two pillars have enough evidence. The method.
| Adoption & momentumweight 40% | — | No public reach signal found |
|---|---|---|
| Expertsindependent reviews · weight 30% | — | Only 2 independent reviews (3 needed) |
| Crowdcommunity sample · weight 30% | 55 | 15 dated posts from hackernews, reddit: 6 positive · 5 mixed · 4 negative (positive + ½ mixed) ÷ n, averaged toward 50 for small samples |
| Rating | — | Not rated: fewer than two pillars have enough evidence. |
Trust & safety
Seven dimensions graded A–D from documented facts. Overall: B.
B
Permission model
Docs: local agents act 'with the same permissions as your user account. Some tool calls may ask for approval before the agent continues.' Approval of shell commands, file changes, MCP use and web fetches is documented; no default sandbox for local workspaces (cloud workspaces run in isolated Linux sandboxes). source
B
Data access scope
Local agents can access anything the user account can; cloud agents are limited to the workspace sandbox plus provided secrets. Documented. source
A
Data storage
Local workspaces: 'your session data stays on your Mac'; model traffic goes direct to the provider. Cloud workspaces (paid, optional) store session inputs/outputs on Conductor infrastructure, encrypted. source
n/e
Data retention & training
Privacy doc defers training/retention to model providers' policies; no Conductor retention period stated for cloud session data. Analytics (PostHog) collected including IP and error messages. source
B
Incident history (24 months)
Security fixes disclosed in the public changelog: crafted Markdown could run code inside the app (0.85.0, 2026-09-09); shell command injection via crafted branch names/clone URLs/file names and remote previews accepting untrusted certificates (0.87.0, 2026-09-18). No CVEs or public exploitation found. source
A
Compliance
Pricing page: 'Conductor holds a SOC 2 Type II attestation'; audit and penetration test reports available via trust center (trust.conductor.build responds 200). source
B
Transparency
Closed source with a detailed, dated public changelog and public docs. source
The experts
2 named independent reviews found; dated reviews from the last 12 months are scored.
- positive
The first time you have three agents working in parallel and you realize you just need to review and merge, it's hard to go back.
Julian Astrada · 26 Apr 2026 · julianastrada.com - mixed
we've gone far enough to demonstrate that parallel running works fine in theory. There is definitely some care needed to represent the workspace name vs. task name vs. task branch
David Eastman (The New Stack) · 11 Oct 2025 · thenewstack.io
The crowd
15 coded posts from hackernews, reddit.
6 positive5 mixed4 negative
- positive
Tried this for a couple days, but conductor.build is way better IME.
HN comment · 29 Jun 2026 · news.ycombinator.com - negative
+1 for Paseo. Switched over to it a few weeks ago from conductor.build then superset.sh.
HN comment · 9 Aug 2026 · news.ycombinator.com - positive
Managing many agents, each in their own sandbox, felt like indisputably the future after using conductor for a day.
HN comment · 3 Apr 2026 · news.ycombinator.com - mixed
I like conductor.build, they are doing amazing job, but I don't want to give up my freedom and get heavily reliant on closed source
HN comment · 8 Feb 2026 · news.ycombinator.com - mixed
I believe both are electron and run like sh*t but Conductor is quite good.
HN comment · 24 Jan 2026 · news.ycombinator.com - positive
it's a pretty slick macOS desktop app that handles running Claude Code within a GUI and uses Git worktrees to manage separate checkouts at the same time.
HN comment (Simon Willison) · 9 Oct 2025 · news.ycombinator.com - positive
I'm using conductor.build and running both Claude Code and Codex. It's taken 95% of my workflow and I'm loving it
HN comment · 24 Nov 2025 · news.ycombinator.com - mixed
I love using Conductor, but it's getting a bit tiring how many things that used to work suddenly stop working.
r/conductorbuild · 11 Sept 2026 · reddit.com
Pricing
As published, checked 26 Sept 2026.
| Plan | Price | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Free | Free | Multiple parallel agents, local workspaces on your Mac, bring your own keys/subscriptions. |
| Pro | $50 / monthly | Conductor Cloud with cloud workspace hours, multiplayer with up to 5 Pro users, API access, mobile app. |
| Teams | $60 / monthly per user | Live collaboration for teams, admin portal, centralized billing (invite-only per cloud FAQ). |
| Enterprise | Custom | DPA, PO billing, SAML SSO, SCIM, custom security settings, SLA. |
Recent changes
- 18 Sept 2026
0.87.0: search across files, routine trigger filters, OpenCode 2 bundled, security fixes. source
- 16 Sept 2026
0.86.0: shareable model loadouts, cloud run scripts. source
- 9 Sept 2026
0.85.0: sidebar sections, routines (cloud), new model picker, private workspaces. source
- 2 Sept 2026
0.84.0: edit files directly in diffs; remote desktop in cloud workspaces (experimental). source
- 31 Mar 2026
$22M Series A announced (per company job post on HN). source
Ranked alongside
Other ranked entries in Orchestrators & meta-harnesses.
OrcaStably AI78
SupersetSuperset Inc.70
HerdrHerdr (Can Celik; YC F26)68
T3 CodePing Labs (ping.gg / T3 Tools)67
Vibe KanbanBloop (company shut down April 2026; now community maintained)60
Sources
Every figure above traces to one of these, observed up to 26 Sept 2026.