Stop babysitting your AI agents.
HawkeRun is a local-first supervisor that keeps Claude, Codex, Ollama, shell scripts, and other AI workers running while you’re away. It detects stalls, kills frozen workers, requeues tasks, and only interrupts you for real decisions.
The supervisor is permanent. AI tools are disposable.
Free tier · No credit card · Windows-first
# HawkeRun — live running T-104 fix login redirect lease 4m12s · ♥ 3s ago claimed T-105 run test suite worker: claude-code waiting T-106 deploy preview needs manager approval killed T-103 scrape (silent) → requeued (attempt 2/3) done T-102 build artifacts 12.4s
Built for developers who walk away
If you start an agent and lose hours because it stalled, froze, or sat waiting for permission — this is for you.
- Leave Claude, Codex, or Antigravity running and come back to nothing
- Run long AI / code / test / build workflows that outlast your attention
- Want agents to make routine decisions without stopping to ask
- Need phone approvals only for the serious decisions
- Want local-first control instead of another hosted coding agent
The No-Ask Gate is the whole point
Most agents stall on a polite question and wait forever. HawkeRun rejects the stall and keeps the work moving.
- The agent says “Want me to continue?” and stops.
- You step away to lunch, a meeting, or bed.
- You come back five hours later.
- Nothing happened.
- The No-Ask Gate rejects the “Want me to continue?” stall.
- The supervisor requeues the task with a recovery packet.
- Claude picks up exactly where it left off and keeps going.
- You only get emailed if there’s a real decision.
Durable by design, not by hope
The supervisor owns state in SQLite (WAL), hands out leased tasks, requires heartbeats, and reclaims anything that stalls.
Drop work on the mission board
Add an agent-task block to a project's markdown file, or use the CLI. The supervisor reads new task IDs and queues them. Markdown is the inbox, not the nervous system.
Workers claim leased tasks
A disposable worker (Claude, Codex, Ollama, any CLI) claims a task with a lease that expires. It must heartbeat. No output for N minutes → it's hung.
The watchdog reclaims the dead
Expired, silent, or orphaned work is killed (taskkill /T /F on Windows) and requeued. On crash, anything claimed or running is recovered. The loop never dies.
new → ready → claimed → running → done
├──→ failed (retries exhausted)
└──→ blocked
claimed/running → ready (lease expired | silent | orphaned)Everything you need to trust your agents unattended
Reliability primitives borrowed from production job queues — applied to disposable AI workers.
Single owner of state
One supervisor process writes SQLite in WAL mode. No multi-writer races, no corruption from agents fighting over a file.
Leases & heartbeats
Every claimed task has a lease_expires_at. No output for N minutes → hung → killed + requeued. Nothing is owned forever.
Watchdog reclaim
Polling is the safety net; file watchers just make wakeups instant. Missed FS events never stall the system.
Crash recovery
On startup, anything left claimed or running is requeued automatically. Pick up exactly where you crashed.
Windows-safe kills
taskkill /T /F tears down the whole process tree, so orphaned npm / python / node children can't fake 'still alive.'
Any AI worker
The shell adapter runs claude -p, codex, ollama run, anything. Add adapters per tool — same lease/heartbeat contract for all.
Manager escalations
Workers can wait for approval. Approve, reject, or redirect from the control panel — or from your phone via the email + Cloudflare relay.
Journal retention
events.jsonl and per-task logs rotate to timestamped archives instead of truncating. Nothing important is silently lost.
Self-healing loop
A bug in one tick is logged and the loop continues. uncaughtException and unhandledRejection don't kill the daemon.
Simple, honest pricing
Priced per supervisor host. Start free and upgrade when your fleet grows.
Free
For trying HawkeRun locally.
- 1 local project
- 1–2 concurrent workers
- Local dashboard
- Shell worker
- Basic watchdog
- Manual CLI approvals
- File-inbox test mode
Pro
For solo developers running AI agents across real projects.
- Unlimited local projects
- Local dashboard
- Background service installer
- No-Ask Gate & Decision Governor
- Watchdog / leases / retries
- BYO email alerts
- All local adapters (Claude, Codex, Ollama)
- Local audit timeline
Power
For developers who leave agents running all day and want phone approvals, deeper audit history, and managed relay features.
- Everything in Pro
- Managed HawkeRun reply relay
- Phone approvals (APPROVE/REJECT/REDIRECT)
- More concurrent worker slots
- Longer audit history retention
- Daily email summary digest
- Advanced checkpoint/resume
- Git worktree automation
Team
For small teams that need shared policies, approvals, and audit history.
- Everything in Power
- Up to 5 team members
- Shared team policies
- Team dashboard & centralized logs
- Role-based approval controls
- Admin security settings
Cancel anytime. Bring your own AI / model accounts — HawkeRun does not include model usage. Local-first: your code stays on your machine.
Running in five steps
It installs locally beside your projects. Here's the whole flow, start to finish.
- 1
Create your account
Sign up free in under a minute — no credit card.
- 2
Copy your license key
Your key is waiting on the dashboard the moment you sign in.
- 3
Download HawkeRun for Windows
Grab the signed installer or the portable build.
- 4
Run hawke init
A guided setup wizard wires up your projects and adapters.
- 5
Start supervising agents
Drop work on the mission board and walk away.
Your code never leaves your machine
HawkeRun is local-first by design. Here's exactly what does and doesn't leave your laptop.
- Your source code stays on your machine — HawkeRun runs beside your projects, not in our cloud.
- License checks send only your license key, app version, and a machine hash.
- The managed relay stores only decision metadata, never your code or prompts.
- Bring your own model and API keys.
Questions, answered
What exactly is HawkeRun?+
A durable, always-on supervisor process that lives outside your projects and keeps AI/CLI workers alive. It owns the state (an embedded SQLite database), hands out leased tasks, requires heartbeats, and a watchdog reclaims dead or stuck work. The supervisor is permanent; the AI tools are disposable workers.
How is this different from just running my agent in a loop?+
Agents don't 'listen and hope.' Every claimed task has a lease that expires, every worker must heartbeat, and silence kills a hung process. On crash recovery, anything left claimed or running is requeued. A bug in one tick is logged and the loop continues — it self-heals instead of dying.
Which AI tools does it work with?+
It works best with controllable CLI tools — Claude Code, Codex, Ollama, shell scripts, test runners, and build jobs — that the included shell adapter runs directly (claude -p, codex, ollama run, anything else). They all share the same lease/heartbeat/requeue contract. GUI tools like Antigravity can be monitored with app keepalive and conversation watchdogs, but HawkeRun does not pretend every GUI app is a reliable headless worker.
Does it run on Windows?+
Yes — it's Windows-first. Kills use taskkill /T /F to tear down the whole process tree so orphaned npm/python/node children can't fake 'still alive.' Run it via Task Scheduler, NSSM, or PM2 to keep the supervisor itself alive.
How do I approve work from my phone?+
The local control panel is desktop-only by design (binds to 127.0.0.1). Phone approvals go through an email + Cloudflare relay path, so you can approve, reject, or redirect a manager escalation from anywhere.
Can I cancel anytime?+
Yes. Plans are month-to-month and you can cancel from your dashboard at any time. The Free tier is free forever.
Keep your agents working while you’re away.
Let the supervisor feed them work, catch the stalls, and requeue the dead — and stop them from wasting hours asking dumb questions.