v0.5.1-alpha.2 is outsee the release →
The two categories
A hosted coding agent platform is a service where a vendor runs the agent on infrastructure it operates and you read the result in the vendor's interface. You sign in and point it at a repository.
A self-hosted runtime is software you install on your own machine. Aether is one: it runs agent CLIs in Docker containers on a Linux server you own, several people can share that server, and every run ends as a git branch. Nothing about it reaches the people who publish it.
| Self-hosted runtime (Aether) | Hosted coding agent platform | |
|---|---|---|
| Where code executes | In a Docker container on a Linux machine you own, with the run's checkout mounted inside it. | In general, on infrastructure the vendor operates and maintains. |
| Who owns the compute | You do: a home server, a spare PC, or a box in a rack. You size it and you keep it running. | Typically the vendor, with capacity metered through your plan. |
| When your laptop closes | Runs keep going. The container and its terminal session live on the server, and you reattach later. | Typically keeps going too, since the work was never on your machine. |
| Supported agent CLIs | Claude Code, Codex, opencode, pi and oh-my-pi ship as harnesses, and you can register another CLI yourself. | Typically the vendor's own agent, since the platform is built around it. |
| Team controls | A collaborator can watch, type into, inject, pause or kill a run; viewers only watch. An admin can limit steering to admins, per workspace or per run. Every act is attributed. | Varies by vendor. Watching a shared session is common; steering someone else's is usually a setting an admin controls. |
| Isolation | One container per run, each with its own git worktree. The container is the boundary, and the agent runs as root inside it by default. | Typically a vendor-managed sandbox or virtual machine per session. |
| How results come back | A branch named aether/run-<slug>-<short-id> that you pull into your clone. Nothing merges itself. | Typically a branch and a pull request on a connected git host. |
| Accounts and sign-in | None. The first identity to link a fresh server becomes its admin; there is no signup and no password. | Typically a vendor account on a paid plan, plus a connected git host. |
| What leaves the machine | Whatever the agent CLI sends its own model provider, using your login. No prompts, code or telemetry reach the people who publish Aether; the server only fetches releases and its standard image from them. | In general your prompts and the code the agent reads reach the vendor as well as the model provider. |
| Cost model | Your hardware, plus whatever your own agent subscriptions or API keys already cost. | Typically a per-seat or usage-based plan, with model usage counted against it. |
When a hosted platform is the better fit
- You do not want to run a server, and nobody on the team wants to be on call for one.
- You have no Linux machine with Docker on it, and no appetite for keeping one alive.
- You are already inside a vendor's plan and the agent you want is the one that vendor ships.
- You would rather the vendor handle capacity, upgrades and the sandbox than do it yourself.
When Aether is the better fit
- You already have a Linux box that stays on, or an old machine you would like to put to work.
- You want more than one agent CLI on the same server, chosen per run.
- You want teammates to watch a live run and type into it, not just read a finished diff.
- You want the checkout, the credentials and the history to sit on hardware you own.
- You want plain git branches back, and you want to decide what merges.