If you are looking for an OpenWork alternative because the work has stopped fitting on one laptop, Kortix is the open-source AI Management System built for that moment. It keeps your agents, skills, memory and connectors in a single repo you own, then runs each session on its own isolated machine. OpenWork is a strong local desktop coworker. The question is what changes when a team, rather than a single operator, has to review and ship the work agents produce.
What OpenWork does well
OpenWork is a free, open-source desktop app for macOS, Windows and Linux that runs AI agents on your own files. It is built on OpenCode, keeps files local in desktop mode, and works with 50+ model providers using your own API keys, a ChatGPT sign-in, or local models through Ollama. Teams share skills and MCP servers, and a single MCP gateway lets Codex, Claude Code, Cursor and other clients reuse the same capabilities. The desktop app is MIT-licensed and needs no account to run locally. OpenWork also carries over a Claude Cowork setup: skills, Anthropic-compatible plugins and MCP servers import, and a single prompt can install the app and open a workspace ready to use. For one person or a small team working on local files, that is a real fit, and the switching cost is low.
Where the desktop model runs out of road
The desktop model assumes the work happens where you sit. Agents execute on your machine, so a long run shares your CPU, your battery and your ports with everything else you are doing, and there is no separate branch or filesystem to keep two sessions apart. A change lands straight in your working files, with no diff and no approval step between the agent and the code you ship, and provider keys live on the same machine. There is no per-session sandbox to contain a risky command. The team control plane, OpenWork Den, sits under the OpenWork EE License, so production use past the free carve-outs needs a subscription. OpenWork chose that shape on purpose, and it serves a single-operator workflow well. A company running ten agents across five teams needs more than that.
What an owned, self-hosted alternative looks like
Kortix takes the same idea of agents working on your files and moves it into a system the company owns. Agents, skills, memory, connector configuration and triggers are files in one git repo you own. That repo is Kortix on GitHub, so every change is a diff you can read, grep and roll back. Each session runs on its own isolated Linux machine, and thousands run in parallel from one configuration.
Work from any agent lands as a change request a human reads and merges, and merging is deny-by-default for an agent. Kortix connects 3,000+ apps plus any MCP, OpenAPI, Postman, GraphQL or raw HTTP API, with connector credentials brokered server-side so they never enter the machine. You bring any model with your own keys, per agent, per session or per message. Kortix is open source (Elastic License 2.0): self-host, read and modify the code.
Kortix opens every entry point a team already uses. You can start agents from the web, Slack, Teams, email, mobile, the CLI or the API, or on a schedule from cron and webhooks with nobody watching. Permissions apply per tool and per resource for people and agents, down to a single command, so a destructive step can be set to ask or block.
Deployment runs on a laptop, a VPS, your VPC or on-prem. Pricing starts at a free tier with 200 sandbox credits a month and moves to a Team plan at $40 per seat per month (checked October 2026).
OpenWork and Kortix side by side
| Dimension | OpenWork | Kortix |
|---|---|---|
| Open source | Desktop app MIT; Den under EE License | Yes, Elastic License 2.0 |
| Where agents run | Your desktop machine | Isolated Linux machine per session |
| How work lands | Straight into your working files | Change request a human merges |
| Models | 50+ providers, your keys | Any model, your keys |
| Team controls | OpenWork Den control plane | Per-resource permissions built in |
| Self-host | Control plane self-hostable | Whole platform, laptop to on-prem |
Which one fits your team
Pick OpenWork when one person or a small team wants agent capability on local files with no account, no server to run and no governance overhead. The desktop app, the shared skills and the free tier are built for exactly that. OpenWork Cloud Team is free for the first 5 seats and $10 per seat per month after that (checked October 2026).
Pick Kortix when the company itself has to live in one repo you own: several agents running at once, an isolated machine per session, a human review on every change, connectors and credentials that stay controlled, and the option to self-host on your own infrastructure. A personal coworker on your laptop and a company system you govern are different purchases, and they reward different choices. If a change to an agent or a skill has to be reviewed the way code is reviewed, the desktop model has no place to put that review.
Start with the open-source Kortix
Run it on your own machine:
curl -fsSL https://kortix.com/install | bash
Or Get started with Kortix on managed cloud, then add your first agent, skill and connector as files. If you are still weighing the two, the OpenWork alternative guide walks through the same decision with more depth.
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