An open-source AI agent that runs on your own machine An open-source AI agent called SAM runs locally on a user's machine, offering a team of specialist agents that can perform tasks across web, files, terminal, email, and GitHub for free. The project claims to be 86% cheaper and 46% faster per task than its previous version, with all tasks served free or locally using 40 free AI brains. SAM is available for macOS, Windows, and Linux, and includes features like semantic cache, life index, and a forge for creating new tools. A free, private team of AI agents that lives on your computer, remembers everything, and actually does the work. No subscription, no cost — runs on free cloud AI tiers by default, or 100% offline on Ollama. Not a chatbot. A doer — with a crew . SAM researches, remembers, and takes real action on your computer web, files, terminal, email, calls, GitHub , and when a job's big it assembles a team of specialist agents to tackle it in parallel — all running free on your own machine. Free forever · Local-first & private · 40 free AI brains · A team of agents · Ask-first safe Works everywhere: macOS · Windows · Linux — see the platform matrix /richhabits/sam/blob/main/docs/PLATFORMS.md curl -fsSL https://richhabits.github.io/sam/install.sh | bash macOS · Linux — one paste. Windows: irm https://richhabits.github.io/sam/install.ps1 | iex ⭐ Star SAM if you want a free, private AI that actually does the work. What Cursor did to coding, SAM does to the whole computer. And it's now ~86% cheaper and ~46% faster per task than v1.3 — with every task served free-or-local reproducible benchmarks /richhabits/sam/blob/main/docs/BENCHMARKS.md . - 🧠 Cascade brain — a classifier routes each request to the cheapest brain that fits trivial → your local model, never a paid API , auto-escalating only when a cheap answer actually fails. ~35% fewer tokens , free-first always. - ⚡ Semantic cache — ask the same thing twice and SAM answers from memory in ~2ms, 0 tokens . - 🗂️ The life index — pick folders and SAM indexes them on-device , keeps them fresh, and cites the file in its answers. Cursor indexes your repo; SAM indexes your world. - 🪄 SAM everywhere — hit Alt+Space ⌥Space on Mac over any app, highlight text, and rewrite / reply / summarize / translate / fix it in place. - 🛠️ The forge — when SAM lacks a tool, it writes one — sandbox-tested, saved disabled for you to review + enable. Most "AI assistants" just talk. SAM works: - 🤝 A team of AI agents — for a big job SAM assembles a crew research, code, writing, strategy, growth, deals that runs in parallel and synthesises one answer. Plus 🥷 the Ninjas — a problem squad that hunts down blockers, debts and loose ends. - 🐝 The Swarm — long-running, continuous background agents that survive restarts and pause to ask for your approval on risky actions. - 🧠 40 free AI brains, auto-rotating — Groq · Cerebras · NVIDIA · DeepSeek · Gemini · Mistral · GitHub Models · SambaNova · Together · Fireworks · and 20 more. One hits a limit, it hops to the next. - 📐️ 173 real tools — web, files, terminal, email, iMessage, calls, calendar, music, camera & vision, screenshots, GitHub read, commit, push, PRs . - ⏰ Scheduled Tasks — run background routines on a cron hourly, daily, weekly e.g., /schedule daily 09:00 | summarize the news . - 📱 iOS Companion — drop notes to SAM from your iPhone/Watch via an iCloud folder; text notes are processed instantly, voice memos when Whisper is installed. - 💻 Native desktop app — Mac/Windows/Linux desktop UI with a global Alt+Space ⌥Space on Mac hotkey to summon SAM anywhere. Build it with npm run build:mac or :win / :linux . Note: package the app from a path with no spaces — native modules can't build otherwise the web app has no such restriction . ✈️ Autopilot — lifts the routine work autonomously; the serious stuff still asks. And it reaches out first with a morning brief + nudges.- 👁️ It can see — looks through your camera, knows your people by sight "hey Alex" , and 🛡️ Guardian mode watches for intruders. - 🧭 Semantic memory · 💼🏠 Business & Personal minds · 📍 live progress tracker · 🗣️ two-way voice . - 🎨 Skins — Jarvis HUD, Ember, Stealth. Clean premium UI, light/dark, streams as it types. - 🔒 Private by design — your keys, memory, vault and documents stay on your machine. Only the prompt you send goes to the brain you pick and nothing at all in offline/Ollama mode . SAM | ChatGPT Desktop | Typical open chat UI | | |---|---|---|---| Cost | Free £0/mo | $20/mo | Free | Runs on your machine | ✅ | ❌ cloud | ✅ | Works fully offline | ✅ Ollama | ❌ | | Takes real actions | ✅ 173 tools | ❌ mostly chat | | Team of agents | ✅ parallel crew | ❌ | ❌ | Your data stays home | ✅ | ❌ | ✅ | Free brains, auto-rotating | ✅ ~40 | n/a | ❌ bring your own | One-paste install | ✅ | ✅ | ❌ usually setup | Telemetry | none | yes | varies | macOS / Linux: curl -fsSL https://richhabits.github.io/sam/install.sh | bash Windows PowerShell : irm https://richhabits.github.io/sam/install.ps1 | iex Detects your OS, downloads the right build, verifies the SHA-256 , installs it, and launches SAM. Re-run any time to update. Then open http://localhost:8787 — free out of the box, no key or setup. macOS also: brew install --cask richhabits/tap/sam. Download SAM — works free out of the box, no API key needed: Mac Apple Silicon M1–M4 : open the .dmg → drag SAM to Applications → launch it. On recent macOS an unsigned app shows "SAM is damaged and can't be opened" — that's not real damage, just Apple's quarantine flag on a browser download. One-line fix: xattr -cr /Applications/SAM.app in Terminal then open it , or System Settings → Privacy & Security → Open Anyway . The one-paste installer above strips this automatically; code-signing removes it for good. Windows : run SAM-Setup-…exe → if SmartScreen appears, click More info → Run anyway once — it's unsigned "Windows says the file isn't safe" / "Windows protected your PC" — that's expected, and it's not actually unsafe.It's the exact same build our CI tests; Windows just shows this for any app that isn't code-signed a paid publisher certificate , until the app builds download reputation. To proceed: if your browser flags the download, chooseKeep; when the blue SmartScreen box appears, clickMore info → Run anyway. Mac shows a"damaged"variant on recent macOS — xattr -cr /Applications/SAM.app or Privacy & Security → Open Anyway; see the Mac note above. The permanent fix is code-signing — see below. Every release ships SHA-256 checksums in its notes auto-generated by CI . To confirm your installer wasn't tampered with, compute the hash and match it: macOS / Linux: shasum -a 256 SAM- .dmg Windows PowerShell : Get-FileHash SAM-Setup- .exe -Algorithm SHA256 The builds are currently unsigned the one-time "unverified app" warning is expected — see above . Removing that warning needs a code-signing certificate; the exact steps + costs are in docs/SIGNING.md , and CI signs automatically the moment the certs are added. Prerequisites: Node.js 20.19+ or 22.12+ https://nodejs.org — or skip this: ./setup.sh installs it for you. Paste these into Terminal exactly as-is they're clean — no comments to trip up zsh : git clone https://github.com/richhabits/sam.git cd sam npm install cp .env.example .env npm start Then open http://localhost:8787 , tell SAM your name, and go — SAM works free out of the box, no key needed. Want more speed or image/video? Add a free key in ⚙ Settings optional — never required, and never by editing files . Mac / Linux— prefer one command? git clone https://github.com/richhabits/sam.git && cd sam && ./setup.sh ⚠️ Windows — do NOT use that one-liner.Windows PowerShell doesn't understand && , and ./setup.sh is a Mac/Linux script you'll get The token '&&' is not a valid statement separator . Instead,the easiest path on Windows is theIf you really want source: run the commands Download button — no terminal at all.one line at a timein PowerShell: git clone https://github.com/richhabits/sam.git cd sam npm install npm start or .\setup.ps1 . Then double-clickto launch any time. START-SAM.bat No keys? You don't need any — SAM runs free out of the box. For a fully-offline brain, install Ollama ; for more speed/power, add a free key in Settings optional — 60 seconds . 👶 Want dead-simple, step-by-step instructions?See— the baby-steps guide: ~15 minutes of copy-paste gets you fast, free AI that basically never runs out. FREE-BRAINS.md Open ⚙ Settings → API keys in the app and paste one or more. SAM rotates across all of them. | Provider | Get a key | Notes | |---|---|---| Groq | | Cerebras cloud.cerebras.ai https://cloud.cerebras.ai NVIDIA build.nvidia.com https://build.nvidia.com Google Gemini aistudio.google.com/apikey https://aistudio.google.com/apikey Mistral console.mistral.ai https://console.mistral.ai/api-keys GitHub Models github.com/settings/tokens https://github.com/settings/tokens More providers = more headroom, still free one account each — SAM rotates across them . Nothing bills you unless you deliberately add a paid provider. SAM ships generic — it becomes about you as you use it: Your name & style — set at first run; SAM adapts. Your brands/projects — edit server/projects.ts , or drop a vault/brands.json gitignored — stays private and SAM loads it. Your memory — SAM learns as you chat; lives in vault/ on your machine only. Your keys & voice — all in Settings , stored only in your local .env . Everything personal lives in gitignored local files — so you can share the code freely without sharing your world. TypeScript brain Express, one process + React/Vite UI · model-agnostic agent loop · rotating key pool · semantic memory & tool routing embeddings · SSE streaming · markdown vault no database . npm start builds the UI and serves everything on port 8787. npm start build + run the whole app npm run dev dev mode with hot reload npm test run the test suite SAM checks for updates on launch — a few seconds after boot it compares your checkout against the remote and, if a newer version exists, prints an "✨ Update available" note and shows a banner in the app . Getting it is one git pull or the in-app Update now button, which does a safe fast-forward . It never pulls behind your back or touches your local edits. SAM keeps everything in one folder, so removing it is total — no scattered files, no leftovers. Quit SAM , then drag the app to the Trash or delete the folder you cloned . Delete your data folder memory, keys, vault, settings — all of SAM lives here: macOS: ~/Library/Application Support/SAM Windows: %APPDATA%\SAM i.e. C:\Users\