DeepSeek Harness vs Manus
DeepSeek Harness (DeepSeek) and Manus (Butterfly Effect Pte. Ltd. (Manus AI), Singapore) side by side on public data, as of Oct 6, 2026.
Side-by-side numbers
| Metric | DeepSeek Harness | Manus |
|---|---|---|
| Pulse Score | 62 | 51 |
| Overall rank | #14 | #39 |
| Downloads, last 7 days | 452K | — |
| Downloads, 7-day change | down 7.9% | — |
| Downloads, 30-day change | — | — |
| VS Code installs | — | — |
| Marketplace rating | — | 4.7 / 5 (38,671) |
| GitHub stars | 244K | — |
| Homebrew installs, 30 days | — | 43 |
| Hacker News mentions, 30 days | 51 | 8 |
| Latest stable release | — | — |
| Stable releases, 90 days | ||
| Terminal-Bench (best run) | — | — |
| Price | Free | Free + $20/mo |
| License | MIT | Proprietary |
| First released | August 2026 | March 2025 |
| Interfaces | — | Web, Desktop, Mobile, Browser extension, API |
| Models | Manus 2.0 model tiers (Max, standard, Lite); underlying third-party LLMs are not publicly specified |
Trends
DeepSeek Harness
An agent harness from DeepSeek in which every capability is a plugin. Its agent reads and edits workspace files, runs commands, delegates work and keeps a plan, and it runs as a desktop app, a browser UI or the dsh command-line tool.
Pricing: Free and open source (MIT); users enter their own DeepSeek API key or another OpenAI-compatible provider.
Manus
General-purpose autonomous agent that plans and runs multi-step tasks in a cloud sandbox, such as research, slides, websites and data analysis, with web, desktop, mobile and browser-extension clients. Manus 2.0, announced in September 2026, added a new agent harness, dedicated cloud computers and a desktop studio.
Pricing: Free plan: 300 daily credits (Chat Mode and Manus 2.0 Lite in Agent Mode). Pro from $20/month (4,000 credits) and from $40/month (8,000 credits, 7-day trial), 17% off with annual billing; Team from $20 per seat/month.