Free
Added on Oct 29,2026
Hob is a free, open-source AI app for Mac, Windows and Linux that works with your files in a similar way to ChatGPT and Claude, except the AI model runs entirely on your own computer.
It picks the best open-weight model your computer can run, such as Qwen, Gemma or GPT-OSS, and handles the setup for you. It needs at least 8 GB of memory, with 16 GB suited to everyday tasks and 32 GB or more for the most capable models.
Hob can read and edit files in folders you choose, look at images, run code in a sandbox, draw charts from spreadsheets, fill in PDFs and search the web, producing results you can open, edit and share.
Privacy is a core focus. Your chats and files stay on your computer, it works offline, you choose which folders it can access, it asks before changing files, and you can undo file changes. Because the AI runs locally, you can keep working with your local files even when you are offline.
It connects to email and calendar, with Mail and Calendar built in on Mac, and you can add your own connectors for apps such as Notion and Linear.
Hob is available in 32 languages and the code is MIT licensed on GitHub. It is backed by Y Combinator and built by the team at Frigade.
Pricing: completely free, with no subscription, no account and nothing to upgrade to.
It is suited to privacy-conscious professionals, students and anyone who wants a local AI assistant for writing, summaries, spreadsheets, documents and research without sending files to the cloud.
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