Swarms vs CrewAI
Swarms offers a catalog of multi-agent structures (sequential, concurrent, graph, hierarchical, group chat, mixture-of-agents) behind a SwarmRouter, so the pattern is a parameter. CrewAI offers two models: role-based crews and event-driven Flows, with documented human review and checkpointing. Swarms gives more patterns; CrewAI gives more documented control around each run.
Facts side by side
| Fact | Swarms | CrewAI |
|---|---|---|
| Type | Framework | Framework |
| Languages / SDKs | Python, Rust | Python |
| License | Apache-2.0 | MIT |
| Pricing model | Open core | Open core |
| Orchestration pattern | Other | Crew / roles |
| GitHub stars | 7,221 (as of 2026-09-30) | 59,217 (as of 2026-09-30) |
| GitHub forks | 1,029 | 8,613 |
| Last push | 2026-09-30 | 2026-09-29 |
| Latest release | 6.8.1 | 1.15.23 |
| Repository | kyegomez/swarms | crewAIInc/crewAI |
| Website | swarms.ai | crewai.com |
| Documentation | docs.swarms.world | docs.crewai.com |
| Last verified | 2026-09-30 | 2026-09-30 |
| MCP support | Yes (checked 2026-09-30) | Yes (checked 2026-09-30) |
| A2A support | Unknown (checked 2026-09-30) | Yes (checked 2026-09-30) |
| AG-UI support | Unknown (checked 2026-09-30) | Partial (checked 2026-09-30) |
| Install verified | Not yet | 2026-09-30 |
Choose Swarms if
- You want to try many orchestration patterns by switching a parameter on
SwarmRouter. - You want to serve agents or swarms as authenticated MCP servers with
MCPDeployer. - You want per-agent file-based memory (
MEMORY.md) with context compression.
Choose CrewAI if
- You need documented human-in-the-loop: Swarms documents only an interactive pause mode, and v13 removed leftover HITL code.
- You need checkpoint and resume for crews and flows.
- You need A2A support, which has no evidence for Swarms.
Migration notes
A CrewAI sequential crew maps to Swarms SequentialWorkflow; a hierarchical crew maps to HierarchicalSwarm (a director writes a plan and issues orders to workers). CrewAI Flows have no single equivalent; GraphWorkflow covers DAG-shaped flows. In the other direction, Swarms structures without a CrewAI counterpart (mixture-of-agents, bidding group chat) need custom Flow code. Check two Swarms caveats before moving production work: telemetry is on by default and captures truncated prompts and outputs until SWARMS_TELEMETRY_ON is set to an off value, and an open issue reports that several structures do not reset their Conversation between tasks. Swarms major versions include breaking changes (v13 removed the speaker-function API), and its GitHub Releases page stops at 6.8.1, so read the docs changelog for versions.
FAQ
Is Swarms related to OpenAI Swarm?
No. Swarms (kyegomez/swarms) is an independent Apache-2.0 project. OpenAI Swarm is a separate educational repository from OpenAI.
Do both support MCP?
Yes. Swarms documents MCP client and server (MCPDeployer); CrewAI documents an MCP client through the mcps field.
Which has a paid offering?
Both vendors sell a hosted product: Swarms has a paid Swarms API, CrewAI sells AMP. The Python libraries are Apache-2.0 and MIT respectively.