Maito vs HQ

Which is better, Maito or HQ?

Maito is the better pick if you want the teammate working this week without anyone assembling files, credentials, runtimes, and bots. HQ is the better pick if portable company files and credential sharing under your own AI tools matter most, and someone on your team will configure the bots.

HQ is a company operating layer for AI: shared files, credentials, connections, and persistent bots that your team's AI tools work on top of. Maito is one managed AI teammate the whole company works with in Slack, email, and its AI assistants. As of October 2026, HQ Cloud has no seat fees and bills by usage, with hosted bots from $100 a month each; Maito is $149 a month with nothing to host.

This guide is for a team deciding whether to assemble its own AI stack. We rechecked HQ's product pages, pricing, and FAQ in October 2026.

What is HQ?

HQ keeps your company's knowledge, skills, projects, and policies in ordinary files, and gives the AI tools your team already uses access to them.

Claude Code, Codex, and Cursor work in HQ's company directory, and chat clients such as Claude Desktop and the ChatGPT app reach it through HQ MCP. HQ Cloud syncs context across people and machines, and credentials are stored once and scoped to people, groups, and bots. HQ Core is open source under the MIT license.

Where HQ is strong:

• Company knowledge in local files you can read, edit, and carry to any AI tool
• An open-source core that runs on your own computer with no account
• No seat fees, and usage pricing that starts at $0

Sources: HQ FAQ, HQ Core, HQ Cloud

And does HQ have bots?

Yes. HQ Bots are persistent teammates with their own identity, role, company context, and approved tools, working in Slack and by their own email address, and starting work when assigned or when a schedule or company event calls for it.

Hosted bots run on boxes billed monthly by size, from $100 to $800, and bots you run on your own computer are free.

Sources: HQ Bots, HQ pricing

And what is Maito?

Maito is one managed AI teammate your company names and shares, in Slack, by email, and in Claude, ChatGPT, Cursor, Codex, Grok, and Muse.

Nobody assembles it. You connect an AI provider, Slack, and the tools a task needs, and anyone in an invited channel can ask. It learns company facts and skills from shared work and runs Loops. Anyone can hand it a code change too; it works in a separate sandbox per task and returns a checked pull request.

Sources: AI teammate

How do Maito and HQ compare at a glance?

HQ is a set of parts for running AI across your company, with portable files and usage pricing. Maito is one ready teammate for code and business work, at $149 per workspace plus your AI provider's usage.

Sources: Maito FAQ and pricing. HQ Core, Bots, FAQ, and pricing.

How much do you assemble with HQ and with Maito?

With HQ, your team sets up the company directory, Cloud sync, credentials, MCP, and each bot's role, tools, and runtime. With Maito, you connect a provider, Slack, and tools, and the teammate is ready.

HQ offers guided setup and free weekly training sessions for teams that want help with the parts.

In Maito, the first person in the channel can ask the same day.

Winner: Maito, for teams without someone to own an AI stack.

Sources: HQ pricing, Maito FAQ

What do Maito and HQ do with a business task?

Maito and HQ can both run a business task from Slack. In HQ, a bot you deployed or the AI tool someone opens does it with HQ's files. In Maito, the same teammate everyone uses does it, and the next person continues in the same thread.

Illustrative conversation, not a recorded product test.

#wholesale

Ben 8:30 AM

@Maito which wholesale accounts haven't reordered in 60 days, and which of them were promised the new price list?

Maito APP 8:41 AM

14 accounts haven't reordered. Six were promised the new price list in September, and none of them got it. I drafted the price list email for those six from the sales inbox. The other eight are listed with their usual order size.

Example complete

HQ's own customer story describes the same kind of shared reporting across wholesale, inventory, and marketing.

Winner: Maito, when the whole team asks in one place. HQ suits teams where each person works in their own AI tool.

Sources: HQ and Bogey Bros

And what do Maito and HQ do when a customer reports a bug?

In HQ, the coding tool or bot you choose fixes the bug with HQ's context. Maito handles the whole bug as one job, from the report to a tested pull request and the reply.

Illustrative conversation, not a recorded product test.

#support

Maya 3:15 PM

@Maito a customer's store shows "out of stock" for a product that has 120 units. Ticket #5528.

Maito APP 3:33 PM

Reproduced. The product has two variants, and the stock check only reads the first, which is at zero. Video attached. PR #618 sums stock across variants and adds a test with two variants. QA passed on the preview. Reply to the customer is drafted below.

Example complete

Winner: Maito. Support starts it, and the reproduction, fix, QA, and reply come back in one thread.

Sources: Support teams

Doesn't HQ remember more?

HQ keeps knowledge as files your team writes, owns, and can carry to any AI tool. Maito learns from shared work as it happens, and your team corrects it by asking.

HQ's files are inspectable and portable, which matters if you switch AI tools often.

Maito learns facts from shared work, such as a pricing rule or how a feature behaves, and saves good results as skills. It keeps revision history, and you can ask it to remember, correct, forget, or restore a fact.

Winner: HQ if you want to own the files. Maito, if you'd rather nobody maintain them.

Sources: HQ Core, Company knowledge, Skills

Can Maito and HQ run work every week?

Yes. HQ bots start from schedules and company events. Maito Loops start on a schedule, from a Slack message or email, or from a webhook any system can call.

Winner: even. Both run recurring work; Maito's runs don't need a bot box.

Sources: HQ Bots, Maito FAQ

Is HQ or Maito more secure?

HQ is local-first: working files stay on your machine, cloud data is encrypted in transit and at rest, credentials get field-level encryption, and each company has an isolated tenant. Maito keeps credentials in an encrypted Vault, logs agent actions for admins, and runs on your own AI provider account.

HQ handles SSO and data residency through enterprise contracts.

Maito admins can filter and export the action log and choose its retention.

Winner: HQ, for teams that want working files on their own machines.

Sources: HQ FAQ, Maito FAQ

What do Maito and HQ cost?

As of October 2026, Maito's workspace is $149 a month with unlimited people and $20 of cloud credits; your AI provider bills model usage. HQ Cloud is $0 a month plus usage, with $10 of usage included, and hosted bots cost $100 to $800 a month each.

Existing HQ plans move to usage pricing on December 19, 2026.

Sources: HQ pricing, HQ FAQ, Maito pricing

What would ten people pay for a month of Maito or HQ?

As of October 2026, ten people on HQ Cloud with one small hosted bot pay $100 a month for the box, plus syncs, MCP calls, and storage beyond the included $10. Maito is $149 with nothing to host, plus model usage on your provider account.

Running the bot on your own computer removes the $100 box and moves that cost to whoever keeps it running.

When is HQ enough?

HQ is enough when your team wants its knowledge and credentials shared under the AI tools each person already uses, and someone is happy to set up and maintain the parts.

Can a team use Maito and HQ together?

Yes. Maito connects to any MCP server, so it can read the company context your team keeps in HQ while working with everyone in Slack and by email.

What moves over when a team goes from HQ to Maito?

HQ keeps company knowledge, worker definitions, and policies as ordinary files, so they carry over as text. Integrations and bot schedules are set up again.

Paste the company directory into a Maito thread and ask it to propose company memories; you confirm each one. Each worker definition becomes a Maito skill.

Reconnect the tools each bot used, turn its schedules into Loops, run each once by hand, and stop the HQ bot before the first scheduled run so owners don't get two reminders.

Sources: HQ Core

So should you choose Maito or HQ?

Choose Maito for one managed teammate the whole company works with, for code and business work, at one price. Choose HQ if your company knowledge must live in files you own and each person works in their own AI tool.

Give one recurring report and one bug to both setups. Compare the result, and the hours someone spent getting each one running.

Maito vs HQ: frequently asked questions

How much does HQ cost?

As of October 2026, HQ Cloud is $0 a month plus usage, with $10 of usage included, and hosted bots cost $100 to $800 a month each. There are no seat fees.

Is HQ open source?

Yes. HQ Core is open source under the MIT license and runs with the HQ CLI on your own computer, without an account.

Does HQ have a free trial?

Yes. New accounts get 30 days covering up to $500 of usage.

Can Maito read our HQ files?

Yes. Connect HQ MCP to Maito like any other MCP server, and Maito uses that context in its work.

Does Maito need its own bot per job?

No. Maito is one teammate for every request, and recurring jobs become Loops it runs on a schedule, from a webhook, or on request.

Sources: HQ pricing, HQ FAQ, HQ pricing, Maito FAQ, Maito FAQ