Manta is free. You supply the box.

Manta is free and open source. No tiers, no seats, no usage caps, no upgrade prompts. You pay your model provider and you supply the hardware Manta runs on. Both competitors 404 on this page. Manta does not.

Manta

$0forever

The server, the desktop client, the phone client, the install script. MIT licensed, self-hosted.

✓No seat count
✓No workspace limit
✓No hosted control plane
✓No telemetry, no analytics
✓No future paid tier

Your model

you pay

Anthropic, OpenAI, DeepSeek, Groq, or any other provider your agent already supports. Billed by them, on their pricing.

✓Claude via your Max subscription or API key
✓OpenAI via your API key
✓Any provider with an OpenAI-compatible API
✓You set the spend cap on their end

Your box

you own it

A Linux VPS, a home server, or a Mac you already have. The installer runs on hardware you control.

✓From a $5 VPS and up
✓Mac mini or laptop running at home
✓Tailnet, public hostname, or both
✓Stops costing the day you stop paying for the box

What's free

The whole product, with nothing locked

The version on GitHub is the version you install. There is no separate "free" tier and no feature that lives behind a paywall in a different binary.

✓The server. tmux, opencode, push, schedules, webhooks, secrets, peer sessions, the per-device pairing flow. All of it.
✓The desktop client. Electron, xterm.js, the React chat panel, the file upload and screenshot detection, voice dictation.
✓The phone client. Capacitor shell, the same React code as the desktop, push delivery, dictation.
✓Updates. Pull from the repo or wait for the in-app update. Both work, both are free.
✓Future features. Anything that lands in main lands in your box when you update. There is no Pro feature in the roadmap.

What you actually pay for

Two things, and both are yours to choose

Manta does not bill you. It also does not bill your model provider. The only money that leaves is what you spend on the model and on the hardware the box runs on.

✓Your model provider. Anthropic via a Max subscription or an API key, OpenAI, DeepSeek, Groq, or any provider with an OpenAI-compatible API. You set the spend cap on their side, not in Manta.
✓Your hardware. A Linux VPS from any provider you already use. A Mac mini at home. A laptop you leave on. The hardware you control, not a managed service.
✓Optional. A domain name, if you want one. Otherwise the installer provisions a free <your-box>.boxes.mantaui.com hostname for you.

Why the box is yours

Self-hosted is the price too

The reason Manta is free is that you bring the box. The product runs on hardware you control, and you can stop paying for the box the day you stop using Manta. The install is reversible.

✓Reversible. Uninstalling stops the server and removes the Caddy vhost. There is nothing to migrate off, no data export to run.
✓No lock-in. The transcripts are plain text on the box. The configuration is JSON. The install script is in the repo.
✓Forkable. If you want a different default model, a different push provider, or a different default port, you can fork the repo and run your own version. The licence allows it.

FAQ

Questions about the price

Five questions, answered in full.

Is Manta really free?

Yes. The server, the desktop client, the phone client and the install script are MIT licensed and free. There is no paid tier, no Pro feature, no in-app purchase, no upgrade prompt. You pay your model provider and you supply the box.

What does it cost to run?

Whatever you spend on the model and whatever you spend on the box. A $5 VPS is enough to host a single agent for a single user. Most teams reuse hardware they already have, which means the marginal cost is the model spend.

Will there be paid tiers in the future?

No. The product is the binary on GitHub. Anything that lands in main lands in your box when you update. There is no paid feature in the roadmap, and there are no plans to add one.

Does Manta take a cut of my API spend?

No. Manta does not bill you, does not see your API spend, and does not sit between you and your model provider. You give the agent your key, the agent talks to the provider directly, and the bill comes from the provider.

What happens if I stop paying for the box?

The server stops. The data is plain text on the disk, so a reinstall on a new box picks up where the old one left off, and a permanent shutdown is just an uninstall. There is nothing to migrate off and no vendor to call. The open source page covers the part that makes this possible.