Lpm
Free, open-source Mac app that runs your project services and AI coding agents side by side in one window.
If you run Claude Code, Codex, or Aider across more than one Mac project, lpm earns its place fast — the parallel project duplication and the amber/blue agent status dots solve a problem tmux and generic process managers leave to you. It's free and open source, notarized, and takes minutes to try. But it's the wrong tool if you're on Windows or Linux, if your team standardizes on dev containers or a cloud dev environment, or if you rarely run more than one agent at a time. Compare it against tmux plus a scripted process manager (more flexible, no GUI) and against Docker Compose (portable and team-ready, but heavier and not agent-aware).
Verified 1d ago · liveness 61/100 · cite: rightaichoice.com/tools/lpm
- Mac developers running Claude Code or Codex across several repos daily
- Developers who want Claude and Codex on the same codebase without branch conflicts
- Anyone tired of hunting for the terminal where an agent is waiting on permission
- Solo devs who want a visual project switcher without adopting Docker
- Windows or Linux users — lpm is macOS only
- Teams standardized on dev containers or cloud/remote dev environments
- Projects that need built-in Docker or container orchestration
We scan live Reddit threads, YouTube comments, X posts, G2 reviews and other communities — and hand you an honest verdict in under a minute.
- Honest verdict, not marketing
- Real pros & cons from real users
- Attributed quotes with receipts
3 free scans · no card needed
Skip lpm if you develop on Windows or Linux, or if your team's standard environment is a dev container or cloud workspace — lpm is a local, macOS-only app and won't fit either.
There is no pricing ladder to climb: lpm is free and open source with no paid tier, no account, and unlimited projects and services. The real cost is indirect — Claude Code, Codex, and Aider are separate paid or metered services you bring yourself. That makes lpm dramatically cheaper than Docker Desktop's paid tiers or a hosted cloud dev environment, but only if you're already paying for an agent CLI.
In short
Lpm — Free, open-source Mac app that runs your project services and AI coding agents side by side in one window. Best for Mac developers running Claude Code or Codex across several repos daily, Developers who want Claude and Codex on the same codebase without branch conflicts, Anyone tired of hunting for the terminal where an agent is waiting on permission. Free to use.
What people actually say about Lpm — is it worth it?
We ran a structured research pass across product reviews, community discussions, and post-purchase forum threads to surface the patterns vendors won't publish themselves. Below: the recurring strengths, the hidden costs people mention most, and the cohort that consistently regrets adopting this tool.
33 mentions across 2 sources (Hacker News, Lemmy) · researched Jul 3, 2026.
Average across the 2 sources that answered — each source counts once, not each post.
- +One-click project start/stop and duplication for parallel agent runs.
- +Launches Claude Code, Codex, Aider directly in the right directory.
- +Live terminal output per service with service profiles.
- +Built-in Git commit and PR generation.
- +AI-generated project configs from natural language.
- −No community reviews or feedback available to validate claims.
- −macOS only — no Linux or Windows support.
- −Potential bugs and missing features are undisclosed.
- −No visible support channels or active community.
- −Limited to local dev projects, not cloud or remote environments.
- • Running AI agents like Claude Code may have their own API costs.
- • macOS-only; no cross-platform support.
Viability Score
How well maintained and how widely used is Lpm? Built from what the vendor actually publishes (docs, changelog, tutorials, integrations, pricing), whether the site is live, and how much real users discuss it. How we calculate this
Last calculated: September 2026
How we score →Key Features
- One-click start/stop boots every project service in parallel
- Live per-service terminal output streamed in individual tabs
- Project sidebar with running dot and per-agent status indicators
- Agent status dots: amber needs-you, shimmer working, blue finished
- One-click launchers for Claude Code, Codex, Aider, and custom commands
- Agents open in terminals pre-pointed at the project root, no cd needed
- Duplicate a project for a parallel checkout with its own services and agents
- Service profiles to run subsets of services for different workflows
- One-shot action buttons for tests, linters, builds, and migrations
- Built-in YAML config editor with live preview
- Config fields for cwd, port, per-service env vars, and dependsOn ordering
- Port field surfaces a clickable link and warns on collisions
- Auto-generate a project config by pointing lpm at a project folder
- In-window browser for previewing dev servers
- iPhone companion app to check Macs remotely
About Lpm
lpm is a free, open-source macOS app that replaces a desk full of overlapping terminal windows with a single project-centric workspace. Define each project in a YAML config at ~/.lpm/projects/myapp.yml — services, actions, terminals, and profiles — and lpm boots every service in parallel when you hit Start, streaming each one's live output in its own tab. The config supports per-service cmd, cwd for monorepos, a port field lpm turns into a clickable link and uses to warn you about port collisions, per-service env vars, and dependsOn ordering with `depends_on` also accepted. Anything that runs continuously is a service; anything that finishes and exits — tests, builds, migrations — belongs in Actions instead, which run as one-shot buttons inside the window. The agent side is the differentiator: configure Claude Code, Codex, Aider, or any custom CLI command as a button, and each agent opens in a terminal that already knows the project root, so there's no cd and no setup. A second agent lands in a tab beside the first, letting Claude Code and Codex work the same codebase at once. The sidebar shows a green dot on running projects and an agent status dot beneath each — amber when it needs you, a shimmer while working, blue when finished — so you stop hunting for the terminal that's waiting on a permission prompt. Duplicate a project to get a parallel checkout with its own services, terminals, and agents, avoiding branch conflicts and context bleed. The scrape shows a built-in YAML config editor with live preview, an in-window browser, an iPhone companion app for checking Macs remotely, and native Apple Silicon plus Intel builds that are Developer ID signed and notarized by Apple. No account, no paid tier, 158 GitHub stars. It is strictly a local Mac tool: there is no Windows or Linux build, no cloud or container-based dev environment, and it is not an AI model itself — it orchestrates the CLIs you already pay for.
Behind the Verdict
What lpm gets right is scoping. It doesn't try to be an IDE, a container runtime, or a model gateway — it assumes you already have Claude Code or Codex installed and paid for, and it fixes the plumbing around them. The strongest piece is the project model. Because a project is just name + root + services + actions + profiles in a YAML file, porting an existing dev workflow is mostly transcription: your `npm run dev` becomes a service, your migration command becomes an action, and `dependsOn` gives you the ordering you were doing by hand. The `cwd` field handles monorepos where each app lives in ./apps/web. The `port` field is more useful than it sounds — it renders a clickable link and warns you before you discover a collision at runtime. The second strongest piece is status. The scrape is unusually explicit about this: amber means an agent needs you, a shimmer means it's still working, blue means done. Anyone who has lost twenty minutes to a backgrounded Claude Code run sitting on a permission prompt will recognize the value immediately. Duplicating a project into a parallel checkout is the other headline feature, and it's what lets one agent refactor auth-service while another migrates the plans table in saas-app without branch conflicts. The config editor edits YAML with a live preview and the app can generate the file for you from a project folder pointing at detected services. Weaknesses are honest and structural. It's macOS only, full stop — the interactive demo even refuses to run on mobile because it's a Mac app. It's local only, so there's no remote or container-based environment; if your team's answer to "works on my machine" is a dev container, lpm doesn't participate. It's not an agent; it's a launcher and a window manager for agents, so its value scales with how many projects and agents you juggle. And a 158-star open-source project is a small bus factor — you're depending on one maintainer's continued interest. Where it fits: solo Mac developers and small Mac-based teams already living in agent CLIs who want a visual project switcher without adopting Docker. Where it doesn't: cross-platform teams, container-first shops, and anyone who runs one terminal at a time.
Researching Lpm? Get your full AI stack in 60 seconds.
Free, no signup — tell us your goal and get tools matched to your budget & existing stack.
Real-world workflow fit
Concrete scenarios for the personas Lpm actually fits — and what changes day-one when you adopt it.
You open lpm, click Start on auth-service, and its web, API, and redis services boot in parallel tabs. You launch Claude Code from the project button; it opens already pointed at ~/Projects/auth-service and asks to run pending migrations. You answer the prompt in plain sight, then switch to docs-site to check whether its Codex run finished.
Outcome: One window replaces the eight overlapping terminals the scrape describes, and the amber/blue agent dots tell you which project actually needs you instead of you cycling through windows.
You duplicate saas-app, so one checkout runs Claude Code on a refactor while the second runs Codex migrating the plans table to cents. Each duplicate has its own services, terminals, and agent, so neither agent's context or branch touches the other's.
Outcome: Two agents work the same repository without branch conflicts or context bleed, and both are visible side by side in the sidebar.
You click the + button, point lpm at the project folder, and it creates the config and detects services for you. If detection misses something, you edit the YAML in the built-in editor with live preview and add a service with cmd, cwd, and a port.
Outcome: First value in minutes — the app writes the config rather than you reverse-engineering a process manager's script syntax.
Use Cases
- Boot your full dev stack (web, API, worker, redis) with one Start click, then launch Claude Code to refactor a feature.
- Duplicate a project so Codex migrates a database table while Claude Code works a separate feature — no branch conflicts.
- Define profiles such as 'default' for coding, 'full' for integration testing, and 'minimal' for demos.
- Let Claude Code analyze a new repo and generate the lpm config so the project is runnable immediately.
- Run your test suite and migration as one-shot actions from the toolbar instead of switching terminals.
- Watch the amber dot to know which agent is blocked on a permission prompt without hunting through windows.
- Use the iPhone app to check whether a long-running agent has finished while away from your Mac.
- Point lpm at a monorepo subfolder via the cwd field so each app's dev server runs from its own directory.
Models Under the Hood
as of 2026-09-09
Limitations
- lpm is a macOS-only desktop app, and the interactive demo only runs on desktop for that reason.
- There is no Windows or Linux build shown in the scrape.
- It is strictly local — the config reference notes that claudeAccount is not applied to SSH projects because the remote host has its own Claude login, and nothing in the scrape describes a container or cloud dev environment.
- Service performance depends on your local hardware. dependsOn is ordering only: lpm starts dependencies first but does not wait for them to finish booting or start listening before moving on.
- The project is small — 158 GitHub stars — so the maintenance bus factor rests on a narrow group of maintainers.
as of 2026-09-14
Verification history
We have re-verified Lpm 8 times since . Each pass re-reads the vendor's own pages and re-checks every listed field against that evidence; passes where nothing had changed are marked as such.
- — re-verified summary, description, our verdict, our analysis, pricing model, pricing tiers, features, integrations, who it suits, who should skip it
- — re-verified summary, description, our verdict, our analysis, pricing model, pricing tiers, features, integrations, who it suits, who should skip it
- — re-verified summary, description, our verdict, our analysis, pricing model, pricing tiers, features, integrations, who it suits, who should skip it
- — re-verified summary, description, our verdict, our analysis, pricing model, pricing tiers, features, integrations, who it suits, who should skip it
- — re-verified summary, description, our verdict, our analysis, pricing model, pricing tiers, features, integrations, who it suits, who should skip it
- — re-verified summary, description, our verdict, our analysis, pricing model, pricing tiers, features, integrations, who it suits, who should skip it
Showing the 6 most recent of 8 verification passes.
Free to cite with attribution — this page re-verifies continuously.
12-month cost
Project the real annual outlay, including the implied monthly cost when only an annual tier is published.
Vendor list price only. Add-on usage, seat overages, and contract minimums are surfaced under Hidden costs & gotchas.
Plans compared
For each published Lpm tier: who it actually fits, and what it adds vs. the previous tier. Cross-reference the cost calculator above for projected annual outlay.
Free
$0
Ideal for
Mac developers who run Claude Code, Codex, or Aider across multiple local projects and want a single window instead of stacked terminals
What this tier adds
Free entry point — the only tier: full app with unlimited projects and services, one-click agent launchers, project duplication, profiles, actions, and native Apple Silicon and Intel builds, with no account and no paid tier
Where the pricing makes sense
The company stage and team size where Lpm's pricing actually pencils out — and where peers do it cheaper.
There is no pricing ladder to climb: lpm is free and open source with no paid tier, no account, and unlimited projects and services. The real cost is indirect — Claude Code, Codex, and Aider are separate paid or metered services you bring yourself. That makes lpm dramatically cheaper than Docker Desktop's paid tiers or a hosted cloud dev environment, but only if you're already paying for an agent CLI.
Setup time & first value
How long it actually takes to get something useful out of Lpm — broken out by persona, not the marketing-page minute.
Download the Apple Silicon or Intel build (Developer ID signed and notarized), and you can be running inside a few minutes: point lpm at a project folder and it generates the config and detects services for you. Add a Claude Code, Codex, or Aider button and your first agent is one click away. Hand-tuning a monorepo config with cwd, env, and dependsOn takes longer — maybe 15–30 minutes for a stack
Switching to or from Lpm
How to bring data in from common predecessors and how to get it back out — written for the switcher, not the buyer.
- →From tmux or a scripted process manager: move each long-running command into a services entry in ~/.lpm/projects/myapp.yml, then set port and dependsOn to replace the ordering you scripted by hand.
- →From Docker Compose for local dev: convert each service to a cmd entry, use cwd for the subfolder each app lives in, and move one-off commands like migrations into Actions.
- →From a drawer of saved terminal windows: create one project per repo, add a service per process, and add Claude Code, Codex, or Aider as agent buttons.
- →From a hand-rolled shell script that boots your stack: keep the individual commands but let lpm start them in parallel and give each one its own output tab.
- ↗To tmux plus a scripted process manager: transcribe each services entry back to a shell command and re-implement dependsOn ordering yourself.
- ↗To Docker Compose: containerize each service, replacing cmd and port entries with compose service definitions.
- ↗To a cloud or container-based dev environment: rebuild the stack remotely, since lpm is local-only and its claudeAccount setting doesn't carry to SSH projects.
- ↗To plain terminal windows: launch each agent and service by hand — you lose the one-window status dots and the duplicate-project parallel checkouts.
Integrations
Resources & Guides
Tutorials & Learning
YouTube returned 6 videos for “Lpm”, and we withheld 6: 6 could not be judged, because “Lpm” is a single word that other videos use for other things. We are showing none, because we could not prove any of them are about Lpm.
Official links
Tools that pair well with Lpm
Common stack mates teams adopt alongside Lpm, with the specific reason each pairing earns its keep.
GitHub Copilot
AI coding agent that completes code, reviews PRs, and runs agents from issue to merge inside GitHub
Refact.ai
Open-source autonomous AI coding agent that plans, executes, and deploys tasks inside VS Code and JetBrains IDEs.
agentcad
Open-source MCP server letting coding agents design, render, and export 3D CAD parts via code
Featured Head-to-Head Comparisons
Lpm vs Spider Cloud
Spider Cloud and Lpm serve entirely different needs — one is a web scraping API for feeding AI agents with data, the other is a local project manager for running AI coding tools. Choose Spider Cloud if you need to extract structured web content at scale for LLMs; choose Lpm if you use Claude Code or Codex daily and want to manage multiple projects and services from a single desktop app. They are complementary, not competitive.
Lpm vs Temporal Ai
Choose Temporal AI if you need reliable, fault-tolerant orchestration for AI agents or microservices in production, especially with human-in-the-loop or Saga patterns. Choose Lpm if you're a solo developer or small team that uses Claude Code/Codex locally and wants to simplify project switching. Temporal is enterprise-grade with a learning curve; Lpm is free and dead simple for local dev.
Lpm vs Voyage Ai
Voyage AI is for enterprises needing high-accuracy domain-specific embeddings; LPM is for solo devs managing local AI coding workflows. Pick Voyage if you need retrieval quality on finance/legal data; pick LPM if you juggle multiple projects with Claude Code daily.
Alternatives to Lpm
View allGitHub Copilot
AI coding agent that completes code, reviews PRs, and runs agents from issue to merge inside GitHub
Frequently Asked Questions
Best-of guides
Used Lpm? Help shape our editorial sentiment research.