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Strands Agents review

Strands Agents is an open-source SDK for building and running AI agents in Python and TypeScript, with any model and any cloud.

Updated Nov 1, 2026. Review written Oct 25, 2026 from the project's own sources; usage data refreshed every Monday.

TL;DR

Strands Agents is an open-source SDK for building and running AI agents in Python and TypeScript. It is for developers who would otherwise write their own agent loop. It runs in your process with no hosted control plane. It includes lifecycle controls, tools, MCP, multi-agent patterns, memory, sessions, guardrails, tracing, and evals in one SDK.

Strands Agents at a glance

Category
Agent frameworks
Maintained by
strands-agents (organization, @strands-agents on GitHub)
License
Apache 2.0
Language
Python, TypeScript, MDX
Repository
github.com/strands-agents/harness-sdk
Website
strandsagents.com
PyPI package
strands-agents 1.62.0
Latest release
harness-python/v0.3.2 on GitHub, Oct 22, 2026
First published
May 14, 2025

What Strands Agents does

  • Strands Agents provides lifecycle controls for the agent loop: turn limits, token budgets, cancellation, and stop reasons.
  • Strands Agents supports tools, structured output, MCP, streaming, and multi-agent patterns as built-in features.
  • Strands Agents works with Amazon Bedrock, Anthropic, OpenAI, Gemini, Ollama, many other providers, and custom ones.
  • Strands Agents traces every decision in the agent loop by default. Hooks let you intercept any step to log, validate, or redirect it.
  • Strands harness gives you a fully assembled agent with defaults for model, tools, memory, sessions, and context management from one call.
  • Strands Agents includes guardrails and steering handlers so agents can correct themselves instead of failing silently.

How it works

Strands Agents runs inside your own Python or TypeScript process, with no hosted control plane. You can start with Strands harness via create_harness() or createHarness(), or use the SDK to own the agent loop and wire tools, model providers, and memory yourself. It connects to model providers such as Amazon Bedrock, Anthropic, OpenAI, and Gemini, and to MCP servers. A strands CLI lets you chat with a harness agent from the terminal.

How to install and start using Strands Agents

Strands harness with pip

pip install strands-harness

Python SDK with pip

pip install strands-agents strands-agents-tools

TypeScript SDK with npm

npm install @strands-agents/sdk

Requirements

  • Python 3.10 or later for the Python SDK.
  • Node.js 22 or later in an ESM project ("type": "module") for the TypeScript SDK.
  • Credentials for a model provider. The TypeScript SDK defaults to Amazon Bedrock, which needs AWS credentials.

First steps

  1. Install Strands harness and call create_harness() in Python, or createHarness() in TypeScript, to get an assembled agent.
  2. Invoke the agent with a prompt, such as asking it to find the slowest test in your repo.
  3. Configure AWS credentials or pass another model, because the TypeScript SDK's new Agent() uses Amazon Bedrock by default.
  4. Move to the SDK when you want to own the agent loop, tools, model providers, and memory yourself.

Who Strands Agents is for

  • Developers who would otherwise hand-roll their own agent loop in Python or TypeScript.
  • Teams that want to switch model providers or clouds without rewriting agent code.
  • Developers deploying agents to AWS services such as Bedrock AgentCore, Lambda, Fargate, or EKS.
  • Teams that need tracing, guardrails, and evals for agents in production.

Limitations to know

  • Strands Agents' TypeScript SDK uses Amazon Bedrock by default, so you must configure AWS credentials or pass another model.
  • Strands Agents' TypeScript SDK requires a Node.js 22+ ESM project.
  • Strands Agents marks some features as experimental, such as the OpenAI Live provider.
  • Strands Agents documents bidirectional streaming for Python only.

Is Strands Agents growing? Usage data

In the week of Oct 25–31, 2026, Strands Agents ranked #204 on the Devtoolwatch Board and #21 in Agent frameworks, with a momentum score of 44 out of 100. Its main package had 8.9M downloads that week, +1% against its own 4-week average.

New GitHub stars per week for Strands Agents12 weeks from Aug 9, 2026: 68, 70, 70, 114, 67, 141, 1.1k, 183, 127, 96, 98, 76 new stars, an average of 184 a week.Aug 9week of Oct 25
New GitHub stars per week for the last 12 weeks, from GitHub's stargazer history (today's stargazers by the week they starred).
Show the weekly numbers
New GitHub stars per week for Strands Agents
Week ofNew stars
Aug 9, 202668
Aug 16, 202670
Aug 23, 202670
Aug 30, 2026114
Sep 6, 202667
Sep 13, 2026141
Sep 20, 20261.1k
Sep 27, 2026183
Oct 4, 2026127
Oct 11, 202696
Oct 18, 202698
Oct 25, 202676

On Hacker News

The Board ranks tools by four signals each week: new stars, new stars for the repo's size, added downloads and download growth beyond the market. How the ranking works.

Strands Agents alternatives

Other AI agent frameworks on the Board in the week of Oct 25–31, 2026, by momentum:

Agent frameworks ranked by momentum, the week of Oct 25–31, 2026
RankToolStarsDownloads/wk
#1Harness²Harness² is a Python framework from Google Research for recursive agent harnessing, refining an agent's prompts, tools, memory and…21.7k–
#2HyperFramesHyperFrames is an open-source framework that turns HTML, CSS, media, and seekable animations into deterministic MP4 videos, built for AI…76.6k1.5M
#3AgentScopeAgentScope is a Python agent framework with an SDK for building ReAct agents and an agent service backend with a web UI.35k51.4k
#4AG-UIAG-UI is an open, event-based protocol that standardizes how AI agents connect to user-facing frontend applications.16.9k4.6M
#5LangGraphLangGraph is a low-level orchestration framework and runtime for building, managing, and deploying long-running, stateful agents in…44.2k18.5M
#6BifrostOpen-source, high-performance AI gateway that works as your LLM gateway, MCP gateway and agent gateway. One OpenAI-compatible API for…9.3k–

All AI agent frameworks, ranked

Recent Strands Agents releases

Strands Agents FAQ

Is Strands Agents free and open source?

Yes. Strands Agents's source code is on GitHub (strands-agents/harness-sdk) under the Apache 2.0 license, so you can use it for free.

How do I install Strands Agents?

Run pip install strands-harness. The strands-agents package needs Python 3.10 or newer. The install section above has the other options from the project's README.

Is Strands Agents still maintained?

Yes. The strands-agents/harness-sdk repository was last updated on Oct 25, 2026, and the latest release, harness-python/v0.3.2 on GitHub, came out on Oct 22, 2026.

How popular is Strands Agents?

Strands Agents has 9k GitHub stars as of Nov 1, 2026. It gained 76 new stars in the week of Oct 25–31, 2026, against a 12-week average of 184 a week. Its main package had 8.9M downloads that week, +1% against its own 4-week average. That made it #21 among AI agent frameworks on the Devtoolwatch Board.

Strands Agents vs LangGraph: how do they compare?

Strands Agents and LangGraph are both tracked by Devtoolwatch as AI agent frameworks. Strands Agents has 9k GitHub stars and LangGraph has 44.2k. In the week of Oct 25–31, 2026, Strands Agents's main package had 8.9M downloads and LangGraph's had 18.5M. LangGraph is a low-level orchestration framework and runtime for building, managing, and deploying long-running, stateful agents in Python or JavaScript. LangGraph review.

Strands Agents vs Pydantic AI: how do they compare?

Strands Agents and Pydantic AI are both tracked by Devtoolwatch as AI agent frameworks. Strands Agents has 9k GitHub stars and Pydantic AI has 21k. In the week of Oct 25–31, 2026, Strands Agents's main package had 8.9M downloads and Pydantic AI's had 1.7M. Pydantic AI is a typed Python agent framework where models are swapped with a string, with tools, structured outputs, durable execution and realtime voice. Pydantic AI review.

What are the best alternatives to Strands Agents?

Other AI agent frameworks on the Devtoolwatch Board in the week of Oct 25–31, 2026, by momentum: Harness² (#1), HyperFrames (#2), AgentScope (#3), AG-UI (#4), LangGraph (#5). The alternatives table above has their numbers.

What is Strands Agents?

Strands Agents is an open-source SDK for building and running AI agents in Python and TypeScript. It runs in your process with no hosted control plane. It covers lifecycle controls, tools, MCP, multi-agent patterns, memory, sessions, streaming, guardrails, tracing, and evals.

What is the difference between Strands harness and the Strands Harness SDK?

Strands harness is a fully assembled agent created with one create_harness() or createHarness() call, with defaults for model, tools, memory, sessions, and context. The SDK lets you control the loop, tools, providers, memory, sessions, and hooks yourself.

Which models does Strands Agents support?

Strands Agents has first-class support for Amazon Bedrock, Anthropic, OpenAI, and Gemini. It also supports providers such as Ollama, LiteLLM, llama.cpp, MistralAI, SageMaker, Vercel, and Writer, plus custom providers.

Does Strands Agents support MCP?

Yes. Strands Agents includes MCP tool support. The project also ships an MCP server that gives coding agents knowledge about building with Strands Agents.

Can Strands Agents be used with AI coding agents?

Yes. Strands Agents offers a plugin for Claude Code, Codex, and Cursor. The plugin adds scaffolding, tool authoring, MCP server connections, web framework guides, and LangGraph migration guidance.

Does Strands Agents need a hosted service?

No. Strands Agents runs in your process with no hosted control plane. You still need access to a model provider, such as Amazon Bedrock or another supported provider.

Sources

  1. strands-agents/harness-sdk on GitHub
  2. Strands Agents README
  3. strands-agents on PyPI
  4. Strands Agents website
  5. Release harness-python/v0.3.2 (Oct 22, 2026)
  6. Release harness-cli/v0.2.2 (Oct 22, 2026)
  7. Release harness-typescript/v0.3.1 (Oct 21, 2026)
  8. Hacker News: Strands Decider 2B: a small, open-source, decision model
  9. Hacker News: Strands Harness
  10. Hacker News: Strands Box: The Big Picture
  11. Devtoolwatch Board, the week of Oct 25–31, 2026

Strands Agents README badge

Maintainers can show the tool's weekly Board rank in their README:

Devtoolwatch badge for Strands Agents

[![Devtoolwatch](https://index.devtoolwatch.com/badge/strands.svg)](https://index.devtoolwatch.com/tools/strands/)

How this page is made: Devtoolwatch writes each review from the project's README, releases, package metadata and website, with an AI model, then checks every claim against the source it cites and drops what the sources don't support. The numbers come from Devtoolwatch's daily GitHub snapshots, GitHub's stargazer history, and the npm and PyPI download APIs. Spotted an error? Email [email protected].