Distilly vs wshobson/agents
Which should you use? A side-by-side look at what each one does, who it suits, what it costs, how hard it is to set up, and where each falls short.
Open source · MIT
Turns a person's messages, docs, and interviews into a reusable profile that AI agents can load.
Open source · MIT
A collection of plugins, agents, skills, and commands that run across several AI coding tools.
The short answer
Choose Distilly if you need…
- Developers who want an agent to answer in the style of a specific colleague or mentor
- People building reusable Agent Skills for supported hosts like Claude Code or Codex
- Users who want a profile of a public figure or author built from public material
- Teams that want to preserve a departing colleague's working knowledge
Choose wshobson/agents if you need…
- Developers who already use one of the listed AI coding tools and want ready-made specialist agents
- Python or JavaScript/TypeScript developers looking for testing, packaging, or project setup guidance
- Teams wanting a shared set of review and security-scanning workflows across different tools
- People who want to install only individual skills without the full plugin set
Side-by-side
| Distilly | wshobson/agents | |
|---|---|---|
| Type | Dev tool | Dev tool |
| Price | Free and open source | Free and open source |
| Licence | MIT | MIT |
| GitHub stars | 26.3k | 42.1k |
| Setup difficulty | Intermediate | Beginner |
| How you get it | Clone and build from source | Install with a package manager |
| Main language | Python | Python |
| Last code update | 24 days ago | 5 days ago |
What each one is
Distilly
Distilly takes material you provide, such as messages, documents, interviews, or public sources, and builds a Person Profile describing a person's experience, decision patterns, expression, and ways of working. The profile is packaged as an Agent Skill that supported AI agent hosts can install and invoke. The README says it models observable patterns and does not claim to clone the person.
wshobson/agents
This project is a shared library of prompts-as-plugins for AI coding assistants. It contains 94 plugins with specialist agents, skills (reference guidance an agent loads when relevant), and commands (named workflows) covering areas like Python, JavaScript, code review, testing, infrastructure, and security. One Markdown source is adapted to Claude Code, OpenAI Codex CLI, Cursor, OpenCode, Antigravity CLI, GitHub Copilot, and Pi.
Best for
Distilly
- Developers who want an agent to answer in the style of a specific colleague or mentor
- People building reusable Agent Skills for supported hosts like Claude Code or Codex
- Users who want a profile of a public figure or author built from public material
- Teams that want to preserve a departing colleague's working knowledge
wshobson/agents
- Developers who already use one of the listed AI coding tools and want ready-made specialist agents
- Python or JavaScript/TypeScript developers looking for testing, packaging, or project setup guidance
- Teams wanting a shared set of review and security-scanning workflows across different tools
- People who want to install only individual skills without the full plugin set
Strengths
Distilly
- Supports several agent hosts, including Claude Code, Codex, Hermes, and OpenClaw, per the README
- Output is packaged in the Agent Skill format, so it is portable across supported hosts
- MIT licensed with a large public community and a published technical report
wshobson/agents
- Covers seven coding tools from one shared source of components
- Large catalog: 94 plugins, 202 agents, 185 skills, and 105 commands according to the README
- Offers a skills-only install route that does not require the full plugin set
Not ideal for
Distilly
- People who need a verified clone of a real person, since the README says it does not claim to clone anyone
- Users without source material, because output quality depends on the materials provided
- Anyone needing a one-click consumer app; the README describes a Skill-based workflow for agent hosts
wshobson/agents
- People who do not use any supported AI coding tool, since the components only run inside those harnesses
- Anyone expecting the scores from the plugin-eval tool to prove a task will succeed, because the README says the LLM judge and Monte Carlo layers are experimental and not validated against human labels
- Users wanting a fully stable, versioned release, since the README lists no latest release
Trade-offs
Distilly
- The README states the profile reflects observable patterns, not the full person, so results can be incomplete or misleading
- Some hosts such as Grok Bot are only a preview and direct repo installation is not verified
- Quality depends heavily on the amount and quality of input material
wshobson/agents
- The README notes that available components depend on the installation route and each harness's limits, so features differ by tool
- Some features (LLM judge, Monte Carlo evaluation) are experimental and may bill your Anthropic API account if ANTHROPIC_API_KEY is set
- Pi agents need a separate subagent extension, and the Codex native and generated routes behave differently
Getting started
Distilly
Clone the repository
git clone https://github.com/titanwings/distillywshobson/agents
Claude Code: register marketplace (run inside Claude Code)
/plugin marketplace add wshobson/agentsClaude Code: install Python plugin (run inside Claude Code)
/plugin install python-development@claude-code-workflowsFrequently asked questions
What is the difference between Distilly and wshobson/agents?
Distilly: Turns a person's messages, docs, and interviews into a reusable profile that AI agents can load. wshobson/agents: A collection of plugins, agents, skills, and commands that run across several AI coding tools. Distilly suits developers who want an agent to answer in the style of a specific colleague or mentor, while wshobson/agents suits developers who already use one of the listed ai coding tools and want ready-made specialist agents.
Are Distilly and wshobson/agents free?
Distilly: Free and open source. wshobson/agents: Free and open source.
Which is easier to set up, Distilly or wshobson/agents?
wshobson/agents is easier to get started with (rated beginner); Distilly is rated intermediate and usually needs more setup.
Is Distilly or wshobson/agents more popular?
wshobson/agents has more GitHub stars (42.1k) than Distilly (26.3k). Popularity isn't the same as fit — check which one matches your use case above.
What are other alternatives to Distilly and wshobson/agents?
Other options people compare them with include Understand Anything, planning-with-files, Ruflo, Agentic Awesome Skills, AutoHarness.
Keep comparing
Built from our catalogue entries for both products: open-source details come from each project's README (AI-assisted, refreshed weekly) and GitHub data; AI-tool details are editorial. Spotted something wrong? Let us know from either product's page.