What is Ovis?
Ovis, formerly herdr web UI, is a free client for herdr, the terminal runtime for coding agents. It is a community project by a single developer, devswha, not a product of the herdr team; it installs as a herdr plugin and needs herdr 0.9.0 or later. A Bun server on your computer reads herdr's socket and each agent's own session files, and serves a React app that shows Claude Code, Codex, OpenCode, Pi, Grok and other agent panes as chats, with approval prompts as tappable cards and the live terminal one click away.
The server listens on 127.0.0.1:7317. Ovis brings no tunnel and no account: you reach it from a phone through Tailscale, a VPN, an SSH tunnel or your own HTTPS proxy, and the installer sets up tailscale serve and prints a QR code when Tailscale is present. Other computers join over SSH from the sidebar. Web push alerts tell you when an agent asks something or finishes.
It installs with a one-line script on Linux and macOS, an Ovis.dmg Mac app or an Ovis.exe for Windows; iPhone and Android apps are in TestFlight and Google Play betas. Licensed MIT and written in TypeScript, the repo was created in September 2026 and has about 1,750 stars; the latest release is v0.4.21 (30 October 2026).
Is Ovis worth it?
Ovis is the best-documented way to answer a herdr agent from a phone, and its value rests on a design choice: it adds nothing between you and the agent. herdr still owns the processes; Ovis reads herdr's Unix socket for status, streams the real herdr terminal attach output for the terminal view, and builds the chat from the agent's own session files, so the same pane is live in your terminal, your browser and your phone at once. An approval, plan or question menu becomes a card; the server checks that the menu is still current before it types your answer, and a typed answer that picks an option waits for Confirm.
How the phone reaches your computer is left to you, and the docs are explicit about what each route exposes. The server binds to loopback only. With tailscale serve, which the installer sets up, the address is reachable only inside your tailnet and your own Tailscale login gets in without a code; other people's devices pair with a six-digit code that lasts ten minutes and is spent after five wrong tries, and each paired device can be revoked or set to watch only. A LAN address, a reverse proxy, Cloudflare Tunnel or the Portal tunnel all work, but there the guide insists on setting OVIS_TOKEN, and it is blunt that until a device is paired or a token is set, a non-loopback address is open to anyone who reaches it. tailscale funnel is unsupported.
Alerts take two paths. In a browser or home-screen app they are standard Web Push, encrypted on your computer and carried by the browser vendor's push service. The native iPhone and Android apps cannot receive Web Push, so they go through push.ovis.sh, a Cloudflare Worker the maintainer runs that forwards ciphertext to Apple or Google; it stores device tokens and timing but holds no key to read the alert, and keeps no logs. The relay's own README admits that registration does not prove the caller holds the token, so a leaked device token could be used to spam or displace a phone's endpoints. The computer sends every alert, so it has to stay on.
The risk worth naming is the one SECURITY.md opens with: anyone who gets past the access check can type into your terminals, as your user. A phone tap that approves git push or a deploy carries the same weight as one at the desk, without the context of the screen. Maturity adds to that. It is a project with one maintainer, who wrote about 1,470 of its commits, with 15 releases between 11 and 30 October 2026, 98 open issues and pull requests, phone apps still in beta and a Mac app that is a native window onto the local server without notifications of its own. Anonymous usage counts are on by default, and the guide lists exactly what they contain. For a herdr user that is a reasonable bargain; for anyone not on herdr, T3 Code covers the same job without it.
Where it earns its place
A freelance developer running Claude Code in herdr on a home Mac mini
Approve a pending permission prompt from a phone instead of walking back to the desk
Install with the one-line script, let it run tailscale serve, scan the QR code with a phone on the same tailnet and turn on Alerts. Free; the only standing cost is keeping the Mac on and the agent plan you already pay for.
An engineer with a laptop, a desktop and a cloud VM, all running herdr
See every agent on every machine in one list and jump to whichever is waiting
Install Ovis on the always-on desktop and add the others under Remote PCs; it reaches them over SSH and installs a loopback-only bridge on each. If the desktop is off, the others have no Ovis, though herdr keeps running.
A two-person team that wants a teammate to watch a long agent run
Share a live view without handing over a shell
Pair the teammate's device as watch only, or use Portal's private link sign-in, which also defaults to watch. A driving device or the token gives a shell as your user, so it stays with the owner.
Before you commit
- Setup
- curl -fsSL https://ovis.sh/install.sh | sh on Linux or macOS (Ovis.dmg or Ovis.exe otherwise) installs herdr 0.9.0+ and Bun 1.4+ if missing, adds the herdr plugin on 127.0.0.1:7317 and, with Tailscale present, serves it to your tailnet with a QR code. Phone apps come from TestFlight or the Google Play beta, or add the page to the home screen.
- Integrations
- Any agent herdr runs; chat view for Claude Code, Codex, OpenCode, Pi, omp, Hermes, Grok, Letta and others that write readable session files, terminal view for the rest. Tailscale, SSH, Caddy, nginx, Cloudflare Tunnel and Portal for access; optional OpenAI transcription for voice input.
- Data and privacy
- Sessions stay on the computer running each agent and are sent only to connected browsers. Push goes through the browser vendor or, for native apps, push.ovis.sh, end-to-end encrypted. Anonymous usage counts with a random install ID and country are on until OVIS_TELEMETRY=0. The optional plan-limit strip sends local agent credentials to each provider's usage endpoint and is off by default. MIT; no security advisories published.
- Cost at scale
- Free. The real costs are an always-on machine to host it, the agent subscriptions it drives, and an OpenAI API key only if you want server-side voice transcription.
- Limits
- Only works with herdr; Windows lacks the herdr-core runtime option; phone apps are beta and the Mac app shows no notifications; install and push need HTTPS, so a plain http LAN address cannot do either; single maintainer with no guaranteed security response time.
What’s good
- Same live herdr pane in terminal, browser and phone at once
- Approval prompts as cards, checked as current before answering
- No account or hosted tunnel; loopback by default with pairing and tokens
- Push alerts end-to-end encrypted, including through its own relay
- Remote PCs over SSH from one always-on install
What’s not
- Requires herdr and a computer that stays on
- One maintainer, v0.4.x with near-daily releases
- A LAN or proxied address is open until you pair or set a token
- Anonymous usage counts are on by default
Best for
herdr users who want to read, steer and approve their agents from a phone or another computer and are willing to run Tailscale or their own HTTPS route.
Ovis alternatives
Ovis: common questions
- Is Ovis worth it?
- Ovis is the phone remote herdr does not ship itself, careful about who gets in, but young, fast-moving and run by one person. We rate it 3.8 out of 5.
- How much does Ovis cost?
- Free and open source (MIT), with no account. Needs herdr, your own always-on computer and your own agent subscriptions.
- What are the downsides of Ovis?
- Requires herdr and a computer that stays on; one maintainer, v0.4.x with near-daily releases; a LAN or proxied address is open until you pair or set a token; anonymous usage counts are on by default.
- Who is Ovis best for?
- herdr users who want to read, steer and approve their agents from a phone or another computer and are willing to run Tailscale or their own HTTPS route.
- How much does Ovis cost for a team or in production?
- Free. The real costs are an always-on machine to host it, the agent subscriptions it drives, and an OpenAI API key only if you want server-side voice transcription.
- Is Ovis safe for company data?
- Sessions stay on the computer running each agent and are sent only to connected browsers. Push goes through the browser vendor or, for native apps, push.ovis.sh, end-to-end encrypted. Anonymous usage counts with a random install ID and country are on until OVIS_TELEMETRY=0. The optional plan-limit strip sends local agent credentials to each provider's usage endpoint and is off by default. MIT; no security advisories published.
- What are the best Ovis alternatives?
- The closest alternatives we have reviewed are T3 Code, herdr and Claude Squad.
Answers checked Oct 31, 2026.