fast-agent
★ 3.8k
vs
ken
★ 20
fast-agent vs ken
fast-agent: fast-agent is a CLI-first framework for building and interacting with sophisticated multimodal AI agents and workflows. It offers comprehensive support for various LLM providers, structured outputs, and vision, with unique features like MCP Feature support and live streaming responses to the terminal.; ken: Ken is a pure Go port of semble, providing fast hybrid code search for agents with drop-in MCP compatibility. It offers a single static binary distribution, approximately 44x fewer tokens than grep+Read at recall@10, and supports indexing source code and documentation. The retrieval algorithm is a verbatim port of semble's hybrid BM25 + Model2Vec approach.
01
TL;DR
Choose fast-agent if…Rapid development and testing of sophisticated multimodal AI agents and workflows.
Choose ken if…Agent code search: quickly find relevant code chunks across large codebases
02
Side-by-Side Comparison
03
Features
fast-agent01Sophisticated multimodal Agent and Workflow creation.
02Comprehensive LLM provider support (e.g., Anthropic, OpenAI, Google, Ollama).
03Structured outputs, PDF, and Vision support.
04CLI-first with interactive terminal UI (TUI-style) and live streaming responses.
05Advanced agentic workflows like Chain, Parallel, MAKER, and Agents As Tools.
ken01Pure Go, no cgo; single static binary with free cross-compilation
02Drop-in MCP-compatible with semble (same tool schemas and output format)
03Verbatim port of semble's hybrid BM25 + Model2Vec retrieval algorithm
04Measured ~44x fewer tokens than grep+Read at recall@10 on agent queries
05Fast cold start (~10–20ms for small indexes)
04
Use Cases
fast-agent↳Rapid development and testing of sophisticated multimodal AI agents and workflows.
↳Diagnosing and tuning agent applications, including those requiring human input.
↳Implementing advanced agentic patterns for error reduction or complex task decomposition.
ken↳Agent code search: quickly find relevant code chunks across large codebases
↳Embedded-corpus distribution: ship documentation as a single static binary with zero infrastructure
↳Database schema indexing: index live Postgres/SQLite/MySQL schemas for agent context
05
Best For
fast-agentTrendingMulti-AgentDev Tooling
kenTrendingCode AssistantRAG / Knowledge Base
FAQ
FAQ
What is the difference between fast-agent and ken?
Both fast-agent and ken are in the Dev Tooling category. fast-agent has 3.8k stars, while ken has 20 stars.
Which is better, fast-agent or ken?
The best choice depends on your use case. Choose fast-agent if Rapid development and testing of sophisticated multimodal AI agents and workflows., and ken if Agent code search: quickly find relevant code chunks across large codebases.
Is fast-agent free or open source?
Yes, fast-agent is open source on GitHub (Apache-2.0).
Is ken free or open source?
Yes, ken is open source on GitHub (MIT).
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