Install herdr with Homebrew, Nix

Project links

• Homepage
• Repository

Commands and aliases

• herdr

Project history

The public repository was created on March 27, 2026. Its README frames Herdr as a Rust terminal application for running coding agents in real PTYs, with workspaces, tabs, panes, detach/reattach behavior, and a background server that keeps sessions alive when the client disconnects.

The project documentation presents two audiences: users new to terminal multiplexers, who can rely on mouse-first pane management, and tmux or Zellij users, who already understand prefix keys, persistent panes, and reattachment. The project-specific twist is that Herdr tracks agent state and exposes local automation hooks.

Adoption history

Herdr appeared during the 2026 wave of terminal coding-agent workflows. Its README lists integrations and detection support for agent CLIs including Claude Code, Codex, Droid, Amp, OpenCode, Hermes Agent, Devin CLI, and other agent-style tools, indicating adoption around multi-agent development sessions rather than general shell multiplexing.

A May 27, 2026 project post described the tool as a few months old and reported thousands of GitHub stars and GitHub-release downloads. That post is useful less as a durable popularity number than as evidence that Herdr's early user base formed around fast-moving agent workflows where frequent updates could otherwise interrupt long-running panes.

How it is used

Users start Herdr with the `herdr` command, which starts or attaches to a background server and opens a workspace. Panes can contain ordinary shells or agent processes, and detaching with the documented keybinding leaves the work running for a later reattach.

For remote development, the project positions Herdr as a multiplexer that runs on the machine where the code and credentials live, reachable over SSH or through Herdr's remote client behavior. Agents can also interact with Herdr through a local Unix socket and command-line API.

Why package nerds care

Herdr is interesting to package-manager users because it packages a new class of developer tool: not an LLM provider and not a chat wrapper, but infrastructure for supervising multiple agent CLIs as ordinary terminal processes. That makes it closer to tmux, Zellij, and process supervisors than to most AI desktop applications.

The package is also a small example of how 2026 AI tooling began to show up in traditional package managers: a single terminal binary distributed through Homebrew, mise, Nix, and release artifacts, while still integrating with rapidly changing external agent CLIs.

Timeline

• 2026-03-27: Public GitHub repository creation date recorded by GitHub.
• 2026-05-27: Project blog described live handoff for updating Herdr without killing terminal processes.
• 2026-06-30: Documentation page recorded a June 30, 2026 update date.

Related projects

• tmux and Zellij are the closest terminal-multiplexer relatives; Herdr's own comparison emphasizes persistent sessions, panes, SSH workflows, and detach/reattach, then contrasts those tools with Herdr's agent-state layer.
• Herdr's README also places it near agent managers and coding-agent CLIs such as Claude Code, Codex, OpenCode, Hermes Agent, and Devin CLI because those processes are the workloads Herdr is designed to host.

Sources

• GitHub repository README for product scope, features, and integration list.
• Herdr documentation for user model and docs update date.
• Herdr project blog for live-update design and early adoption context.