Haystack vs Strands Agents
An independent, evidence-based trust comparison of Haystack and Strands Agents, two Agent Frameworks projects in the HVTracker registry. Scores come from public, checkable signals — supply-chain provenance, OSSF Scorecard, maintenance, and adoption — not popularity.
Haystack leads on trust — 96.9/100 (Grade A) vs 91.3/100 (Grade A), a 5.6-point gap. Full breakdown below.
| Signal | Haystackdeepset-ai/haystack | Strands Agentsstrands-agents/harness-sdk |
|---|---|---|
| HVTrust score | 96.9 | 91.3 |
| Evidence grade | A | A |
| Coverage grade | B | B |
| Overall rank | #1 | #7 |
| Rank in Agent Frameworks | #1 | #4 |
| GitHub stars | 26.3k | 7.0k |
| Last updated | today | 1d ago |
| Build provenance | Yes | Yes |
| OSSF Scorecard | 9.4 / 10 | 5.3 / 10 |
| License | Apache-2.0 | Apache-2.0 |
| Downloads | 244k/wk | 7.8M/wk |
| Trust dimensions (points earned) | ||
| Safety / integrity / 25 | 24.2 | 19.1 |
| Identity & provenance / 18 | 18.0 | 18.0 |
| Transparency / 17 | 16.5 | 13.0 |
| Maintenance / 20 | 20.0 | 19.9 |
| Adoption / 20 | 17.8 | 18.4 |
| Runtime capability surface (full matrix) | ||
| MCP server | Declared | Implemented |
| External providers | 1 — OpenAI | — |
| Requires API keys | No | No |
| Plugin surface | plugins | extensions |
| Provenance drift | Match | Match |
How to read this: HVTrust (0–100) weighs supply-chain signals (provenance, OSSF Scorecard, signed commits, open license) alongside real-world adoption, scaled by an evidence-confidence factor. Grade bands: A ≥ 80, B ≥ 65, C ≥ 50, D < 50. Signals refresh daily. Full methodology v4.3 →