There's an important distinction between the Hermes Agent software and actually running it. The software itself, published by Nous Research, is an open project: its source code is published openly and using it costs nothing in itself. In that sense, the answer to "is it free?" is yes, for the software.
But an AI agent that actually runs — that responds to messages, executes scheduled tasks, stays active 24/7 — needs two things that do have a cost: a server that runs continuously, and calls to a language model (the intelligence that understands messages and generates responses), billed based on usage by the model provider. Neither of these two items is managed or funded by Nous Research: whoever hosts the agent has to pay for them, whether running it independently or via a third-party service.
Concretely, running it entirely on your own, a server suited to personal use costs roughly a few dollars a month, and inference cost depends on the number of messages exchanged and the model chosen — potentially a few dollars to a few dozen dollars per month depending on usage intensity.
Hermes Agent France offers to handle all of this (server, agent, maintenance, support) within a capped subscription, from €49 to €199 including tax per month depending on the plan. So it's not a free service, but one that makes a cost that remains real but variable when self-hosted — predictable and capped instead.
