# smolagents vs Pydantic AI: license, pricing and features compared (October 2026)

Canonical: https://theagenticweekly.com/compare/smolagents-vs-pydantic-ai · Last verified: 2026-10-26 · Published: 2026-10-25 · Author: Agentic Weekly (operated independently from Texas, US) · Evidence: Evidence: Both tools have a Tested entry (scope on each tool page). The facts in the tables were read from each vendor's own pages and the public GitHub API on 2026-10-25 (America/Chicago) and are Reported. The What we measured section lists what we have actually run, with links to the test logs, and what we have not run yet; anything we could not confirm is marked as not captured.

**Our pick:** Pick smolagents for people who want a small hackable agent library; pick Pydantic AI for python teams that value type safety and validation. No overall winner: we have not benchmarked them against each other. **Updated:** 2026-10-26 (America/Chicago).

> smolagents and Pydantic AI are both listed under Agent building. License: smolagents is Apache-2.0; Pydantic AI is MIT. GitHub stars on Oct 25, 2026: smolagents 30,051 (huggingface/smolagents) vs Pydantic AI 20,868 (pydantic/pydantic-ai). Stars measure attention, not quality. smolagents is the better fit for: people who want a small hackable agent library. Pydantic AI is the better fit for: Python teams that value type safety and validation. Facts were read from vendor and GitHub pages on Oct 25, 2026 and are Reported; what we ran ourselves is under What we measured.

## What we measured

We ran both smolagents and Pydantic AI ourselves; the table links each full test log. These are smoke tests on one CPU-only machine, not benchmarks. Both ran the same task on the same local model, so the two results are comparable on that one task only. Model-driven runs used a small local Qwen2.5-3B-Instruct model.

Table: Our own tests for smolagents and Pydantic AI

| Test | smolagents | Pydantic AI |
|---|---|---|
| Hands-on test log (install and a real task) | Tested: smolagents 1.26.0, Oct 25, 2026: passed. smolagents 1.26.0 passed our one-tool task on a local 3B model: 6 of 6 trials; cold uv install 1.5 s. [Full test log](https://theagenticweekly.com/tests/smolagents) | Tested: Pydantic AI 2.61.0, Oct 25, 2026: passed. Pydantic AI 2.61.0 passed our one-tool task on a local 3B model: 3 of 3 trials; cold uv install 3.7 s. [Full test log](https://theagenticweekly.com/tests/pydantic-ai) |

How we test and label results: [methodology](https://theagenticweekly.com/methodology#testing-rig). All test logs: [test hub](https://theagenticweekly.com/tests).

## smolagents vs Pydantic AI at a glance

smolagents and Pydantic AI are both listed under Agent building. Agentic Weekly's smolagents page names Pydantic AI as an alternative. smolagents: Hugging Face's small Python library for agents that write and run code; the docs say the core logic fits in roughly a thousand lines. Pydantic AI: Python agent framework built on Pydantic types, covering agents, realtime voice, image generation and embeddings.

Table: smolagents and Pydantic AI side by side (vendor pages and GitHub, 2026-10-25)

|  | smolagents | Pydantic AI |
|---|---|---|
| Vendor | Hugging Face | Pydantic |
| Listed under | Agent building | Agent building |
| License | Apache-2.0 | MIT |
| Pricing model | Free and open source | Free and open source |
| Free tier | Free to self-host | Free to self-host |
| Paid plans | None listed for the library | None listed for the library |
| Platforms | Python | Python |
| Public repository | huggingface/smolagents: 30,051 stars, last push Oct 22, 2026 UTC (GitHub API, Oct 25, 2026) | pydantic/pydantic-ai: 20,868 stars, last push Oct 26, 2026 UTC (GitHub API, Oct 25, 2026) |
| Latest release we saw | v1.26.0, May 29, 2026 | Oct 25, 2026 |
| Evidence | Tested (scope on its tool page) | Tested (scope on its tool page) |

## How smolagents and Pydantic AI differ

- License: smolagents is Apache-2.0; Pydantic AI is MIT.
- GitHub stars on Oct 25, 2026: smolagents 30,051 (huggingface/smolagents) vs Pydantic AI 20,868 (pydantic/pydantic-ai). Stars measure attention, not quality.
- Latest release we saw: Pydantic AI's newest release on Oct 25, 2026; smolagents v1.26.0 on May 29, 2026 (149 days earlier).
- Plans and prices differ and are not like-for-like (credits, seats and usage limits vary), so we do not name a cheaper tool. The Paid plans row above quotes each vendor's plan list as read on Oct 25, 2026.

Both are listed as "Free and open source", so compare the plan tables rather than the model.

## Which should you pick?

- Pick smolagents if: people who want a small hackable agent library; Code-as-action agent experiments. Skip it if: you need a full production orchestration platform.
- Pick Pydantic AI if: Python teams that value type safety and validation. Skip it if: you need a TypeScript framework.

## Strengths and limits

Table: Strengths and limits as listed on each tool page

|  | smolagents | Pydantic AI |
|---|---|---|
| Strengths | Small codebase; Apache-2.0 | Type-safe design; MIT license |
| Limits | Last release tag we saw is from May 2026; Our test was one small task on a local 3B model; it does not show behaviour with hosted models or larger jobs | Python only; Our test was one small task on a local 3B model; it does not show behaviour with hosted models or larger jobs |

## What we did not verify

- Output quality, speed and reliability beyond the smoke tests listed under What we measured: not compared.

## FAQ

### Is smolagents or Pydantic AI open source?

smolagents: Apache-2.0. Pydantic AI: MIT. Licenses come from each project's GitHub repository or the vendor's own pages, read Oct 25, 2026; read the license text itself before redistributing or building a competing service.

### Does smolagents or Pydantic AI have a free plan?

smolagents: Free: to self-host. Pydantic AI: Free: to self-host. Checked Oct 25, 2026; prices and limits change, so confirm on each vendor's page.

### Which was updated more recently, smolagents or Pydantic AI?

smolagents's newest release we saw is v1.26.0 (May 29, 2026); Pydantic AI's is (Oct 25, 2026). Read Oct 25, 2026 from the official release page or repository; a newer date is not a quality ranking.

### What is the main difference between smolagents and Pydantic AI?

License: smolagents is Apache-2.0; Pydantic AI is MIT. GitHub stars on Oct 25, 2026: smolagents 30,051 (huggingface/smolagents) vs Pydantic AI 20,868 (pydantic/pydantic-ai). Stars measure attention, not quality.

## Sources

- [smolagents docs](https://huggingface.co/docs/smolagents) (fetched 2026-10-25)
- [smolagents repository (GitHub)](https://github.com/huggingface/smolagents) (fetched 2026-10-25)
- [Pydantic AI docs](https://ai.pydantic.dev/) (fetched 2026-10-25)
- [Pydantic AI repository (GitHub)](https://github.com/pydantic/pydantic-ai) (fetched 2026-10-25)

## Related

- [smolagents facts and sources](https://theagenticweekly.com/tools/smolagents)
- [Pydantic AI facts and sources](https://theagenticweekly.com/tools/pydantic-ai)
- [Agent building: all tools we track](https://theagenticweekly.com/best/agent-building)
- [smolagents vs CrewAI](https://theagenticweekly.com/compare/smolagents-vs-crewai)
- [smolagents vs LangGraph](https://theagenticweekly.com/compare/smolagents-vs-langgraph)
- [Pydantic AI vs LangChain](https://theagenticweekly.com/compare/pydantic-ai-vs-langchain)
- [Pydantic AI vs Mastra](https://theagenticweekly.com/compare/pydantic-ai-vs-mastra)

## Changelog

- 2026-10-25: First published. Facts read from vendor pages and the GitHub API on 2026-10-25.

## How to cite

Agentic Weekly, "smolagents vs Pydantic AI: license, pricing and features compared (October 2026)", last updated 2026-10-26, https://theagenticweekly.com/compare/smolagents-vs-pydantic-ai