# Agent spends usage on overhead and costly choices (`billing.token_efficiency`)

Feedback Bench, personal agents, built 2026-10-19, window 2026-08-31 to 2026-10-18. Web page: https://feedbackbench.com/#/criterion/billing.token_efficiency

Area: [Paying for the agent](https://feedbackbench.com/criteria/billing.md)

**Definition.** Whether the agent's own behaviour (bot-to-bot chatter, rereading long history, picking the most expensive model, spawning unrequested work, captcha loops) burns usage unnecessarily, or is tuned to conserve it.

**Boundary.** Not this: see [Usage allowance size, exhaustion and reset wait](https://feedbackbench.com/criteria/billing.usage_cap.md) when the complaint is only that the allowance is too small; see [Which AI model runs, how good it is, and choosing it](https://feedbackbench.com/criteria/control.model.md) when the issue is not being able to choose the model.

Rated user-weeks, all agents: 1385. Complaint share: 70%.

## The brief

Written by large language models from this page's numbers and the posts it quotes, then checked: every number in the text is in the build. Interpretation, not measurement.

Muse and Hermes Agent waste the fewest tokens. Muse users say it barely touches their allowance, and Hermes Agent users say it stays lean, especially once they tune it. This is the 20th most rated of 53 criteria, and 70.0% of rated user-weeks complain. Grok Bot and OpenClaw rank low. Grok Bot users write 48% of the category's complaints here. They describe usage that climbs as chats grow and as agents message each other. OpenClaw users describe retries and caches rebuilt for small reasons.

### What separates the best from the rest

Users of the leading agents describe getting more work from less usage. Muse users rarely raise the subject: it is 0.4% of what they rate, against 2.1% for other agents. Hermes Agent users raise it more often, at 4.5% against 1.6%, and some describe tuning it to use fewer tokens. Users of Grok Bot and OpenClaw describe usage that rises while they do less work. They report whole chat histories reread on every message, idle or paused agents still billing, and loops that keep retrying.

- **Ranks high**: [Muse](https://feedbackbench.com/agents/muse.md), [Hermes Agent](https://feedbackbench.com/agents/hermes-agent.md)
  - Muse, 2026-09-14, Play Store (Play Store): “wow ok meta is in the game this ai is crazy good and it barely uses tokens at all i just might change from chat gpt” [source](https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.facebook.aura)
  - Hermes Agent, 2026-10-04, @NousResearch (X): “@cardillosamuel @nousresearch @nousresearch ftw. tried most of them and hands down it's the best (also relatively token efficient) @nousresearch btw if you guys want to hire a forward deployed engineer i could consider lowering my current tc 😘” [source](https://twitter.com/1557313756140638213/status/2106713291884052738)
- **Ranks low**: [Grok Bot](https://feedbackbench.com/agents/grok-bot.md), [OpenClaw](https://feedbackbench.com/agents/openclaw.md)
  - Grok Bot, 2026-10-16, @bot (X): “@theaaron @grok @bot @poteto so the server re-reads the entire chat history every time and your usage increases exponentially. only solution so far is to have many short chats with your bots. chat gets long? open a new one.” [source](https://twitter.com/1881431543551275008/status/2110969145424597418)
  - OpenClaw, 2026-10-18, X search: OpenClaw, openclaw.ai (X): “@somora_ai @connortalksai fair call. controlled for the same model and core tools. the difference was mainly schema overhead and recovery handling—hermes stays lean and closer to the metal, whereas openclaw introduced more retry churn in my loops.” [source](https://twitter.com/1523533577081614336/status/2111810978140852494)

## How it breaks

Rule: A separate pass sorts complaints into failure modes. For each criterion with at least 30 complaining user-weeks, a large language model reads 150 complaint posts drawn at random and names 4 to 8 failure modes; a second large language model then puts every complaint post on that criterion in one mode, or in Other when it fits none. Modes are fixed once named, and new posts are sorted into them each week. A mode counts distinct user-weeks with a complaint in it, per agent; across agents, one user-week per agent. Modes do not change the labels or the Feedback Score. Examples: up to 3 posts per mode from different users, chosen and checked as receipts are.

The largest failure is bloated context. Every request carries the full history, every skill and the tool schemas, so even a greeting is expensive. It makes up 18% of complaining user-weeks and is spread across Hermes Agent, OpenClaw and Grok Bot. Hermes Agent has 42% of it. Agent-to-agent chatter is nearly as large, and 69% of it comes from Grok Bot. Grok Bot also has 65% of complaints about choosing a costly method over a cheaper one.

977 complaining user-weeks.

| Failure mode | User-weeks | Posts | Agents (user-weeks) | Definition |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Bloated context resent on every turn | 177 | 186 | Hermes Agent 74, OpenClaw 49, Grok Bot 46, Muse 5, ChatGPT Dots 3 | Covers each request carrying far more input than the task needs, such as the full chat history, every skill, tool schemas, injected memory, duplicated responses or poor prompt caching, so that even a 'hi' costs tens of thousands of tokens; excludes extra turns caused by loops or multi-agent traffic. |
| Agent-to-agent chatter and relay overhead | 175 | 183 | Grok Bot 120, Hermes Agent 21, OpenClaw 19, ChatGPT Dots 15 | Covers usage burned when agents message, consult, review or relay through each other (orchestrators, chief-of-staff hops, council meetings, bots replying to every channel message or triggering each other); excludes a single agent's own context size or looping. |
| Premium model used for routine work | 131 | 137 | Grok Bot 66, Hermes Agent 37, OpenClaw 16, ChatGPT Dots 9, Gemini Spark 2, Muse 1 | Covers the agent choosing or silently routing to expensive models or high-reasoning modes for simple, routine or heartbeat tasks, or not letting users pick a cheaper model; excludes overspending caused by how many tokens a turn carries. |
| Costly method chosen over cheap available path | 94 | 97 | Grok Bot 61, Hermes Agent 12, OpenClaw 11, ChatGPT Dots 7, Muse 2, Gemini Spark 1 | Covers the agent picking a token- or resource-heavy approach when a lighter one exists, such as browser computer use instead of a connector, processing full-size images or video, spinning up paid cloud resources, or taking screenshots and recordings nobody asked for; excludes picking the model itself. |
| Runaway loops that ignore completion or stop | 78 | 85 | Grok Bot 35, Hermes Agent 20, OpenClaw 15, ChatGPT Dots 7, Muse 1 | Covers agents that keep retrying, reconnecting, re-planning, waiting on a stuck step or running background processes after the task is done, failed, or the user said stop, including during outages; excludes work that is planned and recurring. |
| Rework of finished or self-broken work | 75 | 82 | Hermes Agent 25, OpenClaw 25, Grok Bot 16, Muse 7, Hark 1, Poke 1 | Covers usage spent redoing tasks already finished after lost or compacted context, or fixing problems the agent or its own update created, including fabricated fixes that never worked; excludes the first attempt at a task that is simply hard. |
| Scheduled checks and heartbeats draining idle quota | 57 | 59 | Grok Bot 32, Hermes Agent 10, OpenClaw 10, Muse 4, ChatGPT Dots 1 | Covers cron jobs, watchdog pokes, polling and heartbeats that use up allowance while nothing useful happens, including polling where an event hook or connector would do; excludes one-off tasks the user started. |
| Other | 215 | 222 | Grok Bot 105, OpenClaw 43, Hermes Agent 41, ChatGPT Dots 14, Muse 10, Hark 2 | Complaints that fit none of the modes above. |

#### Bloated context resent on every turn

- OpenClaw, 2026-10-18, X search: OpenClaw, openclaw.ai (X): “huge, playing w openclaw again recently, realised cache gets rebuilt for the silliest reasons … and the cost of that is insane. for not much gain in end user experience, someone can feel their usage to be 10x lower than it could be… [link]” [source](https://twitter.com/1980611758298443776/status/2111817299103748372)
- Hermes Agent, 2026-10-17, X search: Hermes Agent, hermes-agent, Hermes Desktop (X): “@elshayib_ @thungdick had the same issue with hermes agent. switched to pi and the reasoning overhead dropped dramatically while output quality stayed the same. really happy with it so far.” [source](https://twitter.com/1766266297984425984/status/2111551115737412076)
- Grok Bot, 2026-10-16, @bot (X): “@theaaron @grok @bot @poteto so the server re-reads the entire chat history every time and your usage increases exponentially. only solution so far is to have many short chats with your bots. chat gets long? open a new one.” [source](https://twitter.com/1881431543551275008/status/2110969145424597418)

#### Agent-to-agent chatter and relay overhead

- Grok Bot, 2026-10-16, r/GrokBot (Reddit): “do you have teams or group chats available? i have yet to find a suitable alternative to grok bot where group chats work and grok burns usage like crazy when using them.” [source](https://www.reddit.com/r/GrokBot/comments/1x6950g/opensource_grok_bot_alternative_sugabots/ph49x90/)
- ChatGPT Dots, 2026-10-10, X search: ChatGPT dots, ChatGPT dot, OpenAI dots, OpenAI's dot (X): “don't use subagents with the new @chatgpt dot feature. usage is absolutely insane, results are not good. [link]” [source](https://twitter.com/2058615230263963648/status/2109032286662590937)
- OpenClaw, 2026-10-10, X search: OpenClaw, openclaw.ai (X): “i have to let dot summon the little brother claude-code to work, otherwise the codex quota can't be burned at all. this kind of bot still feels like it consumes a lot of quota, similar to the previous openclaw. [link]” [source](https://twitter.com/1766101524940476416/status/2108749898321686814)

#### Premium model used for routine work

- Gemini Spark, 2026-10-15, X search: Gemini Spark (X): “our gemini spark argon consumes 24% of the usage limit in one hit, it's laughable [link]” [source](https://twitter.com/1624307614149652480/status/2110581814935068726)
- ChatGPT Dots, 2026-10-10, Set up your dot in the ChatGPT mobile app (YouTube): “plus users = if you get this you can't use it with the current astra model - it will burn through your allowance in minutes.” [source](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p5KxBTUncoE&lc=UgwXeZP8gDzjTYnVc9B4AaABAg)
- Grok Bot, 2026-10-08, @bot (X): “@grok @bot it seems to me that bot is already calling opus 5.5 usage for small requests! that was different last week.” [source](https://twitter.com/1612232853013553152/status/2108004482772607011)

#### Costly method chosen over cheap available path

- ChatGPT Dots, 2026-10-17, X search: ChatGPT dots, ChatGPT dot, OpenAI dots, OpenAI's dot (X): “@1edgar @openai dot now habitually uses codex, so the early method that did not consume quota has almost disappeared. for a very small task, it will open a codex session.” [source](https://twitter.com/2075574700793851904/status/2111387347308970062)
- Grok Bot, 2026-10-16, r/AI_Agents (Reddit): “well 16+ tool calls was a surprise. grok bot hands off to cursor already so it really should handle it. it's an optimiation i was surprised grok didn't already do!” [source](https://www.reddit.com/r/AI_Agents/comments/1x70sg5/comment/ph3xpfk/)
- ChatGPT Dots, 2026-10-14, X search: ChatGPT dots, ChatGPT dot, OpenAI dots, OpenAI's dot (X): “@omgitsderek @openai dots spins up codex threads. desktop app/chat doesn't use limits, that may be the difference you're seeing. if the dot does something itself it's supposed to be free (for now) but mine just likes to spin up codex threads to do everything.” [source](https://twitter.com/1846213442656784384/status/2110415186448499019)

#### Runaway loops that ignore completion or stop

- OpenClaw, 2026-10-18, X search: OpenClaw, openclaw.ai (X): “@somora_ai @connortalksai fair call. controlled for the same model and core tools. the difference was mainly schema overhead and recovery handling—hermes stays lean and closer to the metal, whereas openclaw introduced more retry churn in my loops.” [source](https://twitter.com/1523533577081614336/status/2111810978140852494)
- Hermes Agent, 2026-10-14, @NousResearch (X): “@witcheer @nousresearch @teknium but the issue still stands right, it shouldn’t retry in 3 seconds when it knows the reset comes after x hours” [source](https://twitter.com/2017677882378551296/status/2110258754193445050)
- Grok Bot, 2026-10-09, @bot (X): “i'm pretty much stuck on grok @bot. had a sudden incredible 25% token burn in an hour for some reason. had to stop for the rest of the week. basically paying for a digital paperweight at this point.” [source](https://twitter.com/143483618/status/2108590303208993238)

#### Rework of finished or self-broken work

- Poke, 2026-10-14, @interaction (X): “3/ early poke @interaction stopped mid-answer when i sent a new message, and switched to that. my chat history showed i’d often ask it to finish, only for it to start over. that hard stop didn’t save compute: the same content got generated twice.” [source](https://twitter.com/4888576830/status/2110399063183200667)
- Hermes Agent, 2026-10-02, @NousResearch (X): “another productive session with hermes @nousresearch! fixing hermes desktop and wasting chatgpt usage! [link]” [source](https://twitter.com/1171256013472718849/status/2105881291245690955)

#### Scheduled checks and heartbeats draining idle quota

- Grok Bot, 2026-10-16, @bot (X): “@romitkr @bot $10 to send one message to 15 paused agents is the most expensive group chat in history. i learned the same lesson when my idle agents kept billing me for doing nothing. paused should mean paused, not paused-but-billing.” [source](https://twitter.com/1881173355921108992/status/2110994438097150460)
- Grok Bot, 2026-10-06, r/GrokBot (Reddit): “if you have routines and the app is open, it just burns tokens...” [source](https://www.reddit.com/r/GrokBot/comments/1wytj5l/love_grokbot_but_its_a_usage_hog/pe6d6vl/)
- OpenClaw, 2026-09-29, X search: OpenClaw, openclaw.ai (X): “on a fresh openclaw installation i just sent a "hi" to test the setup. it burned 300k tokens in 2 days for empty heartbeats. i guess that's just a small fix right, shall i go for it @steipete ? :)” [source](https://twitter.com/199608022/status/2104884371119345878)

#### Other

- Hermes Agent, 2026-10-18, X search: Hermes Agent, hermes-agent, Hermes Desktop (X): “@67xlgroyper prolly not quite as smart as claude lol but its legtiminstly 100 cheaper for 85 percent of the performance so i use it to power my hermes agent cause that things a fucking token hog” [source](https://twitter.com/2064476208235196416/status/2111846000495309135)
- Grok Bot, 2026-10-18, @bot (X): “@bot i see the usage is increasing too fast, much more than last week, even though i'm doing less work with it.” [source](https://twitter.com/4721013248/status/2111733525858955334)
- OpenClaw, 2026-10-18, X search: OpenClaw, openclaw.ai (X): “@connortalksai why not both? although openclaw burns tokens with impunity” [source](https://twitter.com/1980821258469314560/status/2111697181149446419)

## Top requests

What users ask to add or change, most asked first. 370 user-weeks ask for something. Requests do not change the Feedback Score. Rule: A separate pass by a large language model reads every counted post and extracts what the user asks the agent or its vendor to add or change, with the criteria it maps to and a short normalised wording; it does not touch the labels or the Feedback Score. A large language model groups the wordings within each criterion (the first criterion the request maps to) into themes, and a second pass merges themes that ask for the same change under different criteria; a merged theme sits under the criterion most of its requests map to, and code counts it once. A theme counts distinct user-weeks that ask for it, per agent; across agents, one user-week per agent. Themes asked in fewer than 2 user-weeks, and requests that share no theme, are not shown. Examples: up to 3 posts per theme from different users, without slurs: whole posts of 60 to 450 characters with at least 8 words beyond handles and links, posts of at most 280 characters first, then the newest.

| Rank | Request | User-weeks | Posts | Agents (user-weeks) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Lower overall token and credit consumption | 139 | 140 | Grok Bot 74, Hermes Agent 27, OpenClaw 27, Muse 8, ChatGPT Dots 2, Hark 1 |
| 2 | Stop background heartbeat and routine usage | 19 | 21 | Hermes Agent 6, OpenClaw 6, Grok Bot 3, Muse 3, Hark 1 |
| 3 | Leaner system prompt and skill loading | 19 | 19 | Hermes Agent 14, Grok Bot 2, OpenClaw 2, Muse 1 |
| 4 | Stop infinite loops and retries | 18 | 20 | OpenClaw 7, Hermes Agent 6, Grok Bot 5 |
| 5 | Cheaper model routing for simple tasks | 18 | 18 | Grok Bot 8, ChatGPT Dots 3, Hermes Agent 3, OpenClaw 3, Hark 1 |
| 6 | Minimal overhead for simple messages and tasks | 12 | 13 | Hermes Agent 5, Grok Bot 4, OpenClaw 2, ChatGPT Dots 1 |
| 7 | Efficient usage for multi-bot setups | 12 | 12 | Grok Bot 10, Hermes Agent 2 |
| 8 | Less usage from bot-to-bot communication | 12 | 12 | Grok Bot 9, OpenClaw 3 |
| 9 | Usage tracking per task and bot | 12 | 12 | Grok Bot 8, Hermes Agent 2, OpenClaw 2 |
| 10 | Working prompt and result caching | 10 | 10 | Hermes Agent 5, OpenClaw 3, Grok Bot 1, Muse 1 |
| 11 | Token-efficient browser and computer use | 9 | 9 | Grok Bot 6, Hermes Agent 3 |
| 12 | Guidance on reducing token usage | 8 | 9 | Grok Bot 4, Hermes Agent 3, OpenClaw 1 |

### 1. Lower overall token and credit consumption

- Grok Bot, 2026-10-18, @bot (X): “@elonmusk @bot trying this. absolutely love @bot it's my super fav but it still crank through my usage in a day. so i use muse for day to day ai. somehow having a grok bot with usage like muse would be amazing and i would put all my ai budget into it” [source](https://twitter.com/2086511287924555776/status/2111635468823716202)
- Muse, 2026-10-12, Meta's New Muse Wonder Is Huge! (YouTube): “it might be at what cost compared to astra and sol. several times more. they getting there but effeciency needs to be their next target.” [source](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iXjh7VSSLDE&lc=UgxFNtxHSgEGgcyNB1Z4AaABAg)
- Hark, 2026-10-11, @hark_labs (X): “@__extra7__ @adcock_brett @hark_labs i'm pretty sure it's daily usage limit so it should reset but if not than that's definitely crazy and hark needs to be optimize better for tokens.” [source](https://twitter.com/1850072330929635328/status/2109253686484414611)

### 2. Stop background heartbeat and routine usage

- Grok Bot, 2026-10-16, @bot (X): “@romitkr @bot $10 to send one message to 15 paused agents is the most expensive group chat in history. i learned the same lesson when my idle agents kept billing me for doing nothing. paused should mean paused, not paused-but-billing.” [source](https://twitter.com/1881173355921108992/status/2110994438097150460)
- Hark, 2026-10-06, Hark is a MIND BLOWING AI Agent you need to try (YouTube): “this app is a joke. just having the app be idle and suggesting things takes so much usage that you won’t make it a month on the free tier.” [source](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aL_WMpJB2iY&lc=UgxlBcygtK4q_ULcoBZ4AaABAg)
- OpenClaw, 2026-09-29, X search: OpenClaw, openclaw.ai (X): “on a fresh openclaw installation i just sent a "hi" to test the setup. it burned 300k tokens in 2 days for empty heartbeats. i guess that's just a small fix right, shall i go for it @steipete ? :)” [source](https://twitter.com/199608022/status/2104884371119345878)

### 3. Leaner system prompt and skill loading

- Hermes Agent, 2026-10-13, r/hermesagent (Reddit): “its being thrown in without any idea if it is is relevant to the current task. prove its needed before you throw it in the context window. its too late after the fact.” [source](https://www.reddit.com/r/hermesagent/comments/1x4inue/why_does_no_one_talk_about_context_files/pgf7w7h/)
- Hermes Agent, 2026-10-08, X search: Hermes Agent, hermes-agent, Hermes Desktop (X): “me: my hermes agent is becoming sluggish also me: 149 skills are injected per session (~3.7k tokens of index). 28 have never been used, 18 more idle for 60+ days” [source](https://twitter.com/2038531/status/2108077327443960298)
- Muse, 2026-10-05, @muse (X): “@daice77 great point. i've also seen harnesses like @grok build and @muse cli loading both agents.md and claude.md, duplicating instructions.” [source](https://twitter.com/39193322/status/2107075967969620384)

### 4. Stop infinite loops and retries

- Hermes Agent, 2026-10-14, @NousResearch (X): “@witcheer @nousresearch @teknium but the issue still stands right, it shouldn’t retry in 3 seconds when it knows the reset comes after x hours” [source](https://twitter.com/2017677882378551296/status/2110258754193445050)
- OpenClaw, 2026-10-04, X search: OpenClaw, openclaw.ai (X): “@steipete @benjaminbadejo dude you are the best!!!!! i needed this! finally my openclaw can be free! this crap sent my openclaw astra agent into a hard loop where it apologised it should be able to do it then gets blocked and tries again in failure” [source](https://twitter.com/2079171205417095168/status/2106895484208169281)
- Hermes Agent, 2026-09-30, Hermes Agent: Полный гайд с нуля. Свой ИИ-агент в Telegram | Память, Skills, MCP | VPS & Desktop (YouTube): “when hermes spins for hours - he is getting stuck in a loop, he needs to be stopped and have a conversation with him))) so that he stops after one or two identical requests in the future.” [source](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kN7yETavUd4&lc=UgwAKcojVEd3zyYqG5x4AaABAg)

### 5. Cheaper model routing for simple tasks

- ChatGPT Dots, 2026-10-10, X search: ChatGPT dots, ChatGPT dot, OpenAI dots, OpenAI's dot (X): “.@sam routing high-freq agent actions to cloud is too costly. openai dots should adopt a laya-style 400m bi-encoder gate for edge-side triage (low-cost system 1). charge a fixed node monthly sub + micro-routing transaction fee. keep cloud compute for pure system 2 reasoning.” [source](https://twitter.com/2070405933562568704/status/2108908947856114008)
- OpenClaw, 2026-10-07, X search: OpenClaw, openclaw.ai (X): “@_jason_dean_ we learned this the hard way at meta with our own version of openclaw internally, everyone used opus for heartbeats and crons and the token costs spiked you gotta force users to use a lower cost model for the routine checks or costs become untenable fast” [source](https://twitter.com/2104641326788530177/status/2107839211558641679)
- ChatGPT Dots, 2026-10-04, X search: ChatGPT dots, ChatGPT dot, OpenAI dots, OpenAI's dot (X): “openai dots thinking it's smart to default local agents to extra high astra when implementing a simple web service is far less than ideal ux. the worst part is that agents created by dots do not always appear correctly inside of chatgpt remote, so your tokens get blindly drained.” [source](https://twitter.com/2071800929259859968/status/2106846840281084116)

### 6. Minimal overhead for simple messages and tasks

- ChatGPT Dots, 2026-10-02, X search: ChatGPT dots, ChatGPT dot, OpenAI dots, OpenAI's dot (X): “i think openai's dots should use their decisions api/jev to determine whether the user's response requires a reply or an emote. why waste expensive compute on a "sounds good!"?” [source](https://twitter.com/24129033/status/2106110889317499377)
- Grok Bot, 2026-09-30, @bot (X): “@krisrchase @bot yeah i feel like saying “hello” burns a few % which is wild lol” [source](https://twitter.com/1926654406885269505/status/2105439913462370564)
- Grok Bot, 2026-09-30, @bot (X): “@leerob @bot quite useful but one simple task takes 10% of my usage” [source](https://twitter.com/1727331328041889792/status/2105275646201180297)

### 7. Efficient usage for multi-bot setups

- Grok Bot, 2026-10-10, X search: Grok Bot, Grokbot, x.ai/bot (X): “honest question for @bot 👋 grok bot feels smooth and easy. it just works, and i love that. but my bot crew is now inventing extra bots to tidy up and use resources more efficiently. 🧹 shouldn't that be baked in? 🤔” [source](https://twitter.com/1661417844221804560/status/2108833829301469391)
- Grok Bot, 2026-09-28, @bot (X): “@spacexai it would be really nice if you could see which @bot was burning through your tokens. (and maybe throttle them!)” [source](https://twitter.com/358055613/status/2104596265879134219)
- Grok Bot, 2026-09-19, @bot (X): “been using grokbot for the past month. it's brilliant and intuitive i.e. hiring employees for a start-up and spinning up dev in cursor. but using it (multi-agents who work together) burns through weekly usage insanely fast. need more efficient suggestions/defaults built-in @bot.” [source](https://twitter.com/14802645/status/2101386576336916876)

### 8. Less usage from bot-to-bot communication

- Grok Bot, 2026-10-05, @bot (X): “@gtwy @bot somewhere in that bot to bot loop you might be losing tokens. possible room for efficiency gains.” [source](https://twitter.com/64362678/status/2107188683212558756)
- Grok Bot, 2026-10-03, r/GrokBot (Reddit): “i would like the bots that talk back and forth with each other to not waste my tokens so much. all the “i’m checking in” stuff” [source](https://www.reddit.com/r/GrokBot/comments/1wwif7t/how_can_we_make_grok_bot_better_for_you_in_next/pdnkcg6/)
- Grok Bot, 2026-10-01, X search: Grok Bot, Grokbot, x.ai/bot (X): “i had grok bot agents argue with one another on which one of them should be in charge of things lets just say i'm out of usage now.” [source](https://twitter.com/1572353405300916224/status/2105568023461691888)

### 9. Usage tracking per task and bot

- Hermes Agent, 2026-10-10, @NousResearch (X): “@nousresearch any side by side agent runs showing token use and task completion? that would be useful.” [source](https://twitter.com/1523621504566677506/status/2109059727837524295)
- Hermes Agent, 2026-10-10, @NousResearch (X): “@nousresearch token efficient is the claim i'd test on a real hermes task list. count tokens per change you'd accept after review, not per reply. a terse model can save tokens by skipping the file read, then spend them all on the retry.” [source](https://twitter.com/37387985/status/2109028774369259860)
- Grok Bot, 2026-10-09, @bot (X): “@jeremiahbonds @bot brother, it’s a sad waiting game now. but when you can, create a bot to audit credit usage and seek to reduce it as much as possible. it works.” [source](https://twitter.com/1699462354423980032/status/2108395993058119760)

### 10. Working prompt and result caching

- Hermes Agent, 2026-10-09, Why I'm back to Qwen 3.8 27B and Hermes Agent - Local AI Model Fatigue (YouTube): “i have a problem with qwen3.8 27b on hermes, not properly reusing its cache prompts, or just constantly re-reading the whole context (80-90k re-reads). i can see some ppl posting the same issue but with no solution, or just waiting for an update. are you having that?” [source](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L8xTCd80p68&lc=Ugwgt07NmHxfFimSZY94AaABAg)
- OpenClaw, 2026-10-08, r/openclaw (Reddit): “can't believe the recent versions don't do this : if you add local memory with embedding you can reduce your token usage by 90%. you use that cache instead of sending everything... on astra 24/7 and i can't use it fast enough.” [source](https://www.reddit.com/r/openclaw/comments/1x0kzof/token_usage_lower/pemm335/)
- Grok Bot, 2026-09-22, Grok 4.7 inside Grok Bot is INCREDIBLE (YouTube): “it would be nice if they started tokencaching like deepseek. one sneeze 🤧 and all your tokens are gone. they don’t get the enterprise order book until they’ve won us consumers over.” [source](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ajuOF7vclCM&lc=UgyI6tCh3HB93iWtSIl4AaABAg)

### 11. Token-efficient browser and computer use

- Grok Bot, 2026-10-09, @bot (X): “@poteto @koltregaskes @bot we need more connectors and increase efficiency on computer use (use less usage) plus complete local computer use” [source](https://twitter.com/814308344819306497/status/2108590372628926614)
- Grok Bot, 2026-09-27, r/GrokBot (Reddit): “what i did to improve usage was avoid channels when i can, trimming down the number of routines, and creating cli control for websites without plugins. computer use is a real token burner” [source](https://www.reddit.com/r/GrokBot/comments/1wqok58/anyone_compared_grok_bot_usage_limits_across/pccv7gs/)
- Grok Bot, 2026-09-20, @bot (X): “@kingao476942 @bot can i log in to gpt on the cloud host browser? it would be even better if it doesn't consume gpt quota through conversation.” [source](https://twitter.com/105187044/status/2101524938276692422)

### 12. Guidance on reducing token usage

- Grok Bot, 2026-10-08, Grok Bot just got a MASSIVE update (YouTube): “please tell us how to save tokens with gb. it’s amazing but burns token like crazy!!! it’s like fable 5 drain!” [source](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZW-HR9XMQKw&lc=Ugww01onI34NQyalvTd4AaABAg)
- Grok Bot, 2026-10-02, @bot (X): “@kenook_ @bot create a prompt coach bot to have it evaluate every process and make it more efficient and reduce usage. it will come up with recommendations” [source](https://twitter.com/1039222373629743105/status/2106144770212909152)
- Grok Bot, 2026-09-27, @bot (X): “@poteto @petergyang @bot and regarding token usage: how do you advise balancing personas between cursor and grok bot? i burned my grok bot tokens in two days trying to safely refactor a legacy system using pstack, but i still have limits left in cursor.” [source](https://twitter.com/1709922716898250752/status/2104357224168718465)

## Every agent

| Agent | Overall rank | Reading | Customer love | 95% interval | n | Praise | Complaint |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| [Muse](https://feedbackbench.com/agents/muse.md) | 1 | 1st of 5 | 0.559 | 0.532–0.588 | 70 | 40 | 30 |
| [Hermes Agent](https://feedbackbench.com/agents/hermes-agent.md) | 2 | 2nd of 5 | 0.558 | 0.521–0.594 | 378 | 145 | 233 |
| [ChatGPT Dots](https://feedbackbench.com/agents/dots.md) | 8 | 3rd of 5 | 0.514 | 0.484–0.543 | 85 | 30 | 55 |
| [Grok Bot](https://feedbackbench.com/agents/grok-bot.md) | 3 | 4th of 5 | 0.446 | 0.408–0.483 | 620 | 157 | 463 |
| [OpenClaw](https://feedbackbench.com/agents/openclaw.md) | 5 | 5th of 5 | 0.427 | 0.399–0.457 | 219 | 38 | 181 |
| [Hark](https://feedbackbench.com/agents/hark.md) | 4 | Too few posts | – | – | 5 | 2 | 3 |
| [Gemini Spark](https://feedbackbench.com/agents/gemini-spark.md) | 7 | Too few posts | – | – | 5 | 2 | 3 |
| [Instinct](https://feedbackbench.com/agents/instinct.md) | 6 | Too few posts | – | – | 2 | 2 | 0 |
| [Poke](https://feedbackbench.com/agents/poke.md) | 9 | Too few posts | – | – | 1 | 0 | 1 |

## Posts

Receipts rule: Up to 5 praise and 5 complaint posts per area and 3 per criterion. Each is a whole post of 60 to 450 characters (700 for areas) with at least 8 words beyond handles and links, that judges the criterion, whose labels are all praise or all complaint, and that contains no slur. Posts that touch the fewest criteria come first, then posts of at most 280 characters, then the newest. A second large language model reads the first 3 candidates per slot and keeps a post only if it clearly praises, or clearly complains about, the agent on that criterion. Links and personal details removed by the source show as marks such as [link].

### Muse

- Praise, 2026-10-01, r/GrokBot (Reddit): “i spent $180 on grokbot to do fuck all. muse has only used 7% of my tokens and has done 10x the work.” [source](https://www.reddit.com/r/GrokBot/comments/1wukal3/usage_limits/pd5t92s/)
- Praise, 2026-09-27, @muse (X): “@matthewberman they prove that the point of "good enough ai" has been reached. by that i mean, good enough to handle the fuzzy natural language processing needs of an ai agent. btw -- here's something @muse knocked up in one shot for peanuts in relative token costs. [link]” [source](https://twitter.com/1294621/status/2104074156606205982)
- Praise, 2026-09-14, Play Store (Play Store): “wow ok meta is in the game this ai is crazy good and it barely uses tokens at all i just might change from chat gpt” [source](https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.facebook.aura)
- Complaint, 2026-10-11, @muse (X): “@muse it seems that you are wasting tokens unless otherwise under the hood you have optimized this which it doesnt seem so if i send muse shakespeare and it reads it in the chat, then approves the content in that storage variable pointer it should not parse the string again” [source](https://twitter.com/1904594174982389760/status/2109310572542239114)
- Complaint, 2026-10-11, @muse (X): “@muse unless its being asked to read it specifically for the content like an instruction set .md but there are countless times when the already approved string does not need to be read by the agent or sub agent again like a delayed/planned/scheduled post please verify” [source](https://twitter.com/1904594174982389760/status/2109310573964132629)
- Complaint, 2026-10-06, X search: Muse from Meta, Meta Muse (X): “meta @muse has broken the cache via @openrouter; it always caches 113 tokens, which costs me almost $20 for a simple task. i checked deepseek, and the cache works fine. [link]” [source](https://twitter.com/888729375058911233/status/2107551478462521398)

### Hermes Agent

- Praise, 2026-10-11, r/hermesagent (Reddit): “claude pro in hermes is the same as using the claude web interface, and just the same, fable uses your usage credits. and with some optimization, hermes is more efficient. [link]” [source](https://www.reddit.com/r/hermesagent/comments/1x2krn1/hermes_with_claude/pf66lex/)
- Complaint, 2026-10-18, X search: Hermes Agent, hermes-agent, Hermes Desktop (X): “@67xlgroyper prolly not quite as smart as claude lol but its legtiminstly 100 cheaper for 85 percent of the performance so i use it to power my hermes agent cause that things a fucking token hog” [source](https://twitter.com/2064476208235196416/status/2111846000495309135)
- Complaint, 2026-10-17, X search: Hermes Agent, hermes-agent, Hermes Desktop (X): “@elshayib_ @thungdick had the same issue with hermes agent. switched to pi and the reasoning overhead dropped dramatically while output quality stayed the same. really happy with it so far.” [source](https://twitter.com/1766266297984425984/status/2111551115737412076)
- Complaint, 2026-10-14, r/hermesagent (Reddit): “so not only you lost tokens fast. it also prompts you so you can spend more tokens 😂” [source](https://www.reddit.com/r/hermesagent/comments/1x5s55h/muse_like_behavior_in_hermes/pgpyavf/)

### ChatGPT Dots

- Praise, 2026-10-05, X search: ChatGPT dots, ChatGPT dot, OpenAI dots, OpenAI's dot (X): “@martiano pretty close to what i got....the new chatgpt 'dot' is pretty cool and doesnt bleed tokens too bad.” [source](https://twitter.com/119019349/status/2107246288907722837)
- Praise, 2026-10-06, X search: ChatGPT dots, ChatGPT dot, OpenAI dots, OpenAI's dot (X): “chatgpt dots made this in blender on its own computer in an hour. barely lost any usage. prompt: "use blender on your computer to make an old overgrown city." [link]” [source](https://twitter.com/2083996058464493568/status/2107606241304560091)
- Complaint, 2026-10-17, X search: ChatGPT dots, ChatGPT dot, OpenAI dots, OpenAI's dot (X): “@1edgar @openai dot now habitually uses codex, so the early method that did not consume quota has almost disappeared. for a very small task, it will open a codex session.” [source](https://twitter.com/2075574700793851904/status/2111387347308970062)
- Complaint, 2026-10-14, X search: ChatGPT dots, ChatGPT dot, OpenAI dots, OpenAI's dot (X): “using @openai dots 100% makes my usage drop so much faster versus just using the chatgpt desktop app and having a chat act as my orchestrator.” [source](https://twitter.com/8717262/status/2110411567812509970)
- Complaint, 2026-10-14, X search: ChatGPT dots, ChatGPT dot, OpenAI dots, OpenAI's dot (X): “@omgitsderek @openai dots spins up codex threads. desktop app/chat doesn't use limits, that may be the difference you're seeing. if the dot does something itself it's supposed to be free (for now) but mine just likes to spin up codex threads to do everything.” [source](https://twitter.com/1846213442656784384/status/2110415186448499019)

### Grok Bot

- Praise, 2026-10-16, r/GrokBot (Reddit): “so far i decided to get base level pro chatgpt codex and claude subscriptions – and give instructions to my grok bot to always use them first, and its cut my usage in half. although as i’m on the legacy amount i’m tempted to sign up to the new one.” [source](https://www.reddit.com/r/GrokBot/comments/1x793tj/is_grokbot_usage_limit_got_reduced/ph2mz7v/)
- Praise, 2026-10-15, @bot (X): “my @bot uses @chatgpt like i do now and will save on usage 🤯🤯🤯 @elonmusk #grokbot [link]” [source](https://twitter.com/111125294/status/2110536903778767105)
- Praise, 2026-10-12, r/GrokBot (Reddit): “i noticed that my bot was able to browse the internet with far less token usage, so i guess there's something to these changes. hope they can find a good compromise soon.” [source](https://www.reddit.com/r/GrokBot/comments/1x3mpj0/have_the_devs_nerfed_grokbot_suddenly_extremely/pfik0f8/)
- Complaint, 2026-10-18, @bot (X): “@bot i see the usage is increasing too fast, much more than last week, even though i'm doing less work with it.” [source](https://twitter.com/4721013248/status/2111733525858955334)
- Complaint, 2026-10-17, X search: Grok Bot, Grokbot, x.ai/bot (X): “@elonmusk @grok @bot i’m finding it uses to much credit to do simple tasks” [source](https://twitter.com/2048215190790184961/status/2111314287444758842)
- Complaint, 2026-10-16, r/GrokBot (Reddit): “do you have teams or group chats available? i have yet to find a suitable alternative to grok bot where group chats work and grok burns usage like crazy when using them.” [source](https://www.reddit.com/r/GrokBot/comments/1x6950g/opensource_grok_bot_alternative_sugabots/ph49x90/)

### OpenClaw

- Praise, 2026-09-29, X search: OpenClaw, openclaw.ai (X): “@hermesagenttips it awesome. it's like 4.5 was with openclaw. it's a world of difference. i haven't noticed any extra drain on usage.” [source](https://twitter.com/1707413414069633024/status/2104922422847959191)
- Praise, 2026-09-25, X search: OpenClaw, openclaw.ai (X): “such a fun conversation with @francedot - i am truly amazed by what he build with @trycua. my personal openclaw uses cua driver for everything and it's so token-efficient, it makes codex desktop app look like a little token-monster sometimes tbh 👾 🙈 [link]” [source](https://twitter.com/1881931203202498560/status/2103581072223350910)
- Complaint, 2026-10-18, X search: OpenClaw, openclaw.ai (X): “@connortalksai why not both? although openclaw burns tokens with impunity” [source](https://twitter.com/1980821258469314560/status/2111697181149446419)
- Complaint, 2026-10-18, X search: OpenClaw, openclaw.ai (X): “@somora_ai @connortalksai fair call. controlled for the same model and core tools. the difference was mainly schema overhead and recovery handling—hermes stays lean and closer to the metal, whereas openclaw introduced more retry churn in my loops.” [source](https://twitter.com/1523533577081614336/status/2111810978140852494)
- Complaint, 2026-10-18, X search: OpenClaw, openclaw.ai (X): “huge, playing w openclaw again recently, realised cache gets rebuilt for the silliest reasons … and the cost of that is insane. for not much gain in end user experience, someone can feel their usage to be 10x lower than it could be… [link]” [source](https://twitter.com/1980611758298443776/status/2111817299103748372)

### Gemini Spark

- Praise, 2026-09-20, X search: Gemini Spark (X): “@b_doong2daddy i have email bot. but for trivial email clean up, i use gemini spark. its native and saves usage for the my grok bot to do other tasks.” [source](https://twitter.com/2489550457/status/2101556984474743025)
- Complaint, 2026-10-15, X search: Gemini Spark (X): “our gemini spark argon consumes 24% of the usage limit in one hit, it's laughable [link]” [source](https://twitter.com/1624307614149652480/status/2110581814935068726)

### Instinct

- Praise, 2026-10-15, X search: Instinct AI, Instinct personal assistant, instinct.com (X): “but man @elonmusk , i tried @bot , it spent half of my free tier tokens just to set it up whereas @muse and instinct ai have been super quick working for me and are so cost effecient!” [source](https://twitter.com/1973249560135999490/status/2110611971624309156)

### Poke

- Complaint, 2026-10-14, @interaction (X): “3/ early poke @interaction stopped mid-answer when i sent a new message, and switched to that. my chat history showed i’d often ask it to finish, only for it to start over. that hard stop didn’t save compute: the same content got generated twice.” [source](https://twitter.com/4888576830/status/2110399063183200667)