Denly vs Conductor: local parallel agents and task policy

Updated 2026-11-06

Conductor’s local parallel-agent workflow can still suit existing Mac users. New buyers should first read its November 2026 transition announcement; the older cloud and pricing documentation no longer describes an open signup path.

Denly is a control plane for coding agents (Claude Code, Codex, Cursor, Grok Build, Antigravity) that run on your own machines using your vendor subscription or API key. It manages tasks, plans and reviews across projects; Git-backed tasks can open pull requests, while no-Git projects end with a review of local changes.

Our trade-off, first.Work runs only while your machine is awake and online: queued work waits for an available runner. Your Git host receives pushed code and your AI provider receives the context its CLI sends. Denly receives selected uploads, including READMEs, plans, transcripts and no-Git review diffs, that can contain source; see the data boundary and optional encryption coverage.

Conductor availability, checked 6 November 2026.Conductor announced it is joining Meta. New signups closed November 4; Cloud becomes read-only November 13 and shuts down November 20, 2026. Local model updates and critical fixes continue until early 2027. Read the Conductor transition announcement and Conductor November 4 changelog before deciding.

Conductor and Denly side by side

Decision	Conductor	Denly
Local platform	macOS desktop app; Windows and Linux are not available in the installation docs. Conductor installation	Runner CLI on macOS, Windows and Linux, controlled from a browser.
Parallel agents	Independent workspaces have separate branches; agents can also share a workspace. Conductor parallel agents	Tasks across projects and machines, with checkout locks and plan-dependent parallelism.
Runtime choice	Claude Code, Codex, Cursor and OpenCode. Conductor overview	Claude Code, Codex, Cursor, Grok Build and Antigravity, installed and authenticated on the runner.
Plans and review	Plan Mode for Claude Code/Codex; workspace diffs, PR and merge tools. Conductor agent modes Conductor overview	Workspace flow policy can require plan approval and PR review across projects, with an explicit Autopilot exception.
Inference billing	The Cloud FAQ describes using your subscriptions or API keys, including locally. Conductor Cloud FAQ	Existing vendor subscription or API key. Denly never marks up tokens; coordination plans are separate.
Cloud and collaboration	Cloud docs describe shared sandboxes and chats, but the announced shutdown now takes precedence. Conductor Cloud documentation Conductor transition announcement	Shared projects, member routing and tracker/chat connections on Teams; execution remains on your machines.
New adoption	New signups are closed; existing users have a dated transition path. Conductor transition announcement	Free to start within plan limits; Pro and Teams add capacity and team features.

Product descriptions on this page were read from Conductor’s official announcement, changelog and documentation linked above on 6 November 2026. These products change; check their own pages before deciding.

Free and paid Denly plans. Free is for one person with two machines and one active task per machine; storage, schedules and enrollments also have limits. Pro adds parallel execution and higher limits; Teams adds seats and shared workspaces. Your existing vendor subscription or API key pays for AI usage under that provider's terms. Denly never marks up tokens and does not add provider allowance. See pricing and all plan limits.

When to pick Conductor

Our recommendation for existing users: local Conductor can remain useful for hands-on parallel work on a Mac during the announced support window. Its workspace-oriented interface may already fit your review habits. Adding Denly solely to run two agents can introduce unnecessary setup and a different task model.

For new users, the signup closure changes the decision. Check the current announcement before investing in setup; this page does not recommend starting a new Conductor Cloud workflow.

When to pick Denly

Evaluate Denly if you want work to arrive in a shared queue from trackers or chat, use several runtime CLIs across projects, and apply the same plan and review policy on your own machines. That is a workflow choice, not a guarantee of feature parity or a migration tool.

Make the gates policy. Denly's supervised flow is submit task → approve plan → build and run configured checks on the runner → review the PR and decide whether to merge. Workspace flow policy can require a minimum or exact flow. Keep Autopilot disabled when human approval is mandatory: if an owner/admin enables it and a creator opts a task in, that task skips human gates. See flows and gates.

Denly connects 15 tracker and chat tools, including Jira, Linear and Slack. Connections can route tasks to projects and members; Teams permissions and assignments govern shared projects. Each runtime must be installed and authenticated on its runner. This combination is our reason to consider Denly, not a claim that other products lack integrations or collaboration.

Denly's limitations: you must install and maintain the runner and CLIs, keep a machine available, and accept the selected-upload data boundary. Free does not provide parallel tasks on one machine. A team must budget for seats as well as its provider accounts and hardware.

Company context, not proof of product fit

Conductor announced a 22 million USD Series A on March 30, 2026. Conductor Series A announcement. Funding does not establish reliability, adoption or future availability; the later transition notice is the relevant source for continuity.

See the illustrated workflow demo, then follow the setup documentation with a small task and explicit acceptance checks.

Questions people ask

Can a new user sign up for Conductor?

The Conductor transition announcement says new signups and downloads closed November 4, 2026. Existing users should follow its export and transition instructions.

Is local Conductor still Mac-only?

Yes, according to the Conductor installation page fetched for this comparison: macOS is supported and Windows/Linux are not yet available. That statement concerns the desktop app.

Does Conductor only support Claude Code and Codex?

No. The current Conductor overview also lists Cursor and OpenCode. Vendor choice is not unique to Denly.

Is Denly a drop-in Conductor replacement?

No. Denly adds a runner service, project/task configuration and a browser control plane. It does not import Conductor workspaces or promise the same desktop experience. Test a small project and inspect the review and data workflow before moving work.