Nod by n8n: Open source personal agent with its own computer
n8n Labs, the experimental team inside workflow company n8n, released Nod on November 10, 2026 as a research preview for Mac and Windows. Unlike a workflow, Nod is a standalone app that runs a private virtual machine on the user's computer with its own browser. It acts across the user's apps and websites, and it can sign in to sites that have no formal integration. Product Hunt's listing frames it as handling the tasks that surround a person's job. The code is free and published on GitHub under Apache 2.0.
Only the owner can give Nod instructions, and the agent requests confirmation before any send, payment or deletion the owner never asked for. According to n8n's community post, an email or web page cannot grant it permission. The GitHub readme gives examples such as pursuing unpaid invoices, drafting call briefs from messages and calendar entries, and cancelling free trials. Users pay their chosen model provider through an API key, a ChatGPT Plus or Pro plan, or a local open-source model, and API usage shows a per-task cost and stops at a monthly limit.
The desktop app needs macOS 14 or later, and Windows 11 support is still a preview. Each installation has one owner, and Nod cannot make phone calls. n8n lists a hosted version and shared team use as future work. The GitHub repository reports a 93.2% score on the LongMemEval memory test, up from 79%.
Why it matters
For founders building agent products, Nod shows a design where the user brings the model, so inference costs do not have to sit inside the product price. That lowers the barrier for rivals, since the runtime is public under a permissive license. Teams will need to match visible permission prompts, per-task cost displays and local credential storage, because a free project now sets those as baseline expectations.
For investors, the release shows n8n testing whether single-person agents can sit beside its team automation business without a paid entry point. Value in this category may shift toward hosted service, team administration and reliability, none of which n8n has shipped yet. Early benchmark figures and the research preview label suggest buyers should wait for independent results before pricing reliability into deals.
Key points
- 1Nod launched November 10, 2026 as a research preview from n8n Labs.
- 2The desktop app requires macOS 14 or later, with Windows 11 support still in preview.
- 3Nod is licensed under Apache 2.0, and its code is public on GitHub.
- 4Each installation has one owner, and Nod cannot make phone calls.
- 5n8n's repository reports a 93.2% LongMemEval score, up from 79%.
