Hermes Agent Release Notes

Patch release rolling up the ~204 PRs merged since v0.21.6 into a tag (October 11, 2026): source installs now update to tagged releases only, the desktop gains a channel switch, signed thinking survives resume, and updates stop failing behind regional firewalls. The window since v0.21.6 carries 740 non-merge commits, 4,156 changed files (+86,775 / −26,980), 204 merged PRs and 69 closed issues. Full curated notes ship with v0.22.0.

The first patch tag cut by the new stable release pipeline (October 8, 2026): one attempt ref, a tested Docker image, and a receipt tag at publish. The window since v2026.9.24 carries 8,867 non-merge commits, 8,342 changed files (+772,490 / −225,600), 2,106 merged PRs and 3,027 closed issues. Full curated notes ship with v0.22.0; this page records the shape of the tag, the three security fix groups, and the changes already running on your machine.

Patch release (tag v2026.9.24): the 460 merged PRs since v0.21.4 rolled into a stable tag for Docker images, Hermes Cloud and hosted deployments. Full curated notes are deferred to v0.22.0; this page records who the tag is for and the eight change groups in the window that are live today and not yet written up anywhere.

Patch release (The One-Gateway Patch): the ~1,812 PRs merged since v0.21.3 rolled into a stable tag for Docker images, Hermes Cloud and hosted deployments. Full curated notes ship with v0.22.0; this page records who the tag is for and the topology convergence, connector and CLI changes already live in the window.

Patch release (The Sign-In Patch): the tag that carries the remote-gateway sign-in fixes to Docker images, Hermes Cloud and hosted deployments — a Desktop wake burst can no longer rotate the same refresh token twice and revoke the whole session, refresh runs off the event loop, and long-lived processes stop leaking duplicate state.db writer handles.

Patch release (The state.db Patch Release): six PRs close 44 issues around session storage, so a second writer can no longer cancel a lock, healthy WAL databases no longer wedge, a corrupt full-text index degrades search instead of killing the turn, and one bad row can no longer take down `sessions list`; profile isolation is tightened end to end; the desktop backend startup storm is over; credentials become usable without the agent ever seeing a secret; and a SHA-pinned plugin index plus a unified Plugins page land in Desktop.

Patch release (The Consolidation Release): the codebase is restructured and slimmed by ~34% with zero behavior change; delegate_task reports each result as it lands and children can hand background processes back to the parent; MCP servers can authorize with device codes on headless hosts; OpenRouter provider pins become per-model and model pickers refresh every 20 minutes; search_files runs native ripgrep up to 6x faster; compaction keeps its prefix cache across rebuilds; and cron keeps continuity across silent ticks while surfacing missed-fire catch-up lateness.

Minor release (The Pantheon Release): Bot Mode built into the desktop app with named agent avatars and group chats; hermes peer for bot-to-bot DMs across profiles and gateways; cron jobs gain persistent memory, continuity and durable notepads; live subagent steering with JSON-schema output validation; an MCP command center with hermes:// deep links; a CLI power wave (command palette, richer /model and /status, status-bar metrics, terminal pets); six new providers; the agent drives the desktop browser; and security hardening for instruction files, redaction, and Windows approvals. Rolls up the v0.20.1–v0.20.6 patch windows.

Patch release: ~525 PRs and ~1,313 commits since v0.20.5. Consent-gated real-profile browsing lets the agent browse as you with your real logins; the desktop Browser gets its own OS window plus a managed SSH remote-update engine; the remote MCP catalog grows past 50 live-verified vendor servers; web_search/web_extract gain TTL result caching; lean-tail compression becomes the default; tool_search learns multi-query searches with stemming; stored secrets can opt into OS-keychain encryption; and new models land across the pickers (GLM-5.3-Flash, MiniMax M3 free, MiniMax H3 Max video).

Patch release: ~323 PRs and ~746 commits since v0.20.4. Bot Mode group chats finally accept files (PDF/image drag & drop), old conversations fold into one-line summaries, and blob avatars arrive; hermes worktree list/prune safely reclaims accumulated worktrees and merged branches; hermes update --plan plus structured update receipts make upgrades auditable; cron jobs gain persistent memory and per-job reasoning effort; and opencode-free becomes a truly keyless free model in the /model picker.