# Manus AI 41 Hacker News commenters recommended Manus AI and 30 criticized it, November 2025 to November 2026. It was recommended in 8 of 13 months. **Verdict:** Recommended for handling multi-step tasks like research, reports and slide decks. Critics call it a thin wrapper over other models with overstated marketing. ## Why people recommend it - Strong multi-step agent task completion (5 comments): "Manus had a better approach than some of the competitors of the space, allowing for far more agentic flows" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46435484)) "Manus is a very capable agent for daily non-coding tasks. Their cron job ability also shined out" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49265105)) "Manus gets shit done, whereas I have to constantly babysit other tools." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49268746)) - Strong web research and deep dives (3 comments): "Manus was great, used it for months for exploring ideas, making reports and such." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48094286)) "Deep Research quite good in terms of browsing the web, better than Gemini's" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49261507)) "It's great for like researching deep on a topic." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49261844)) - Impressive early results ahead of rivals (4 comments): "It was the best product in its area from the beginning, eclipsing anything US produced prior to it" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46430054)) "Manus was pretty damn good at delivering impressive results well before other providers." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46426868)) "Manus at the time is break through result." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46442461)) - Good at making presentations (2 comments): "it's hard to find a rival when it comes to making PPTs" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46430164)) "Manus seems to deliver more organised results." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46431388)) ## What people warn about - Seen as thin wrapper on Claude (3 comments): "it quickly became a joke in about two weeks after it became obvious that they were a thin layer on top of Claude and all marketing" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46430975)) "An API wrapper isn’t some new technology. You get nothing from it." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46431038)) "Definitely feels like a Claude wrapped with a lot of marketing." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46428580)) - Marketing outpaces technical substance (3 comments): "It was never a breakthrough of any kind, especially not the "half of all office work are now obsolete" kind they tried to claim." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46442883)) "Their marketing skills and hyping skills are far superior to their technical skils" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46429731)) "Manus is particularly egregious in their false advertising" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46440856)) - Depends on underlying models changing (2 comments): "the latest models no longer have these gaps and the entire premise of having a unique product focus on this area is no longer relevant" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49264880)) "A service precariously sitting on top of a LLM that can change any minute now." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46409620)) ## Alternatives hackers recommend - [OpenClaw](https://hackerapproved.com/p/openclaw.md): 776 recommend - [Muse by Meta](https://hackerapproved.com/p/muse.md): 147 recommend - [Hermes Agent by Nous Research](https://hackerapproved.com/p/hermes-agent.md): 84 recommend - [Clawdbot](https://hackerapproved.com/p/clawdbot.md): 69 recommend - [NanoClaw](https://hackerapproved.com/p/nanoclaw.md): 58 recommend ## Where to get it - [Visit the official site](https://manus.im/) ## Cite as Hacker Approved, "Manus AI", https://hackerapproved.com/p/manus/ (counts from 1,795,640 Hacker News comments, November 2025 to November 2026).