Agent frameworks
Mastra
TypeScript agent framework with workflows, memory, and evals in one package.
- Category
- Agent frameworks
- Pricing
- Open source
- Runs
- Hosted or self-hosted
- Languages
- TypeScript
- Interface
- Library
- Source
- Open source
What Mastra is
Mastra is TypeScript-first rather than a port of a Python library, which shows in the ergonomics. It bundles agents, durable workflows, memory, retrieval, and evals in one package, with local development tooling for inspecting runs.
Best for
TypeScript and Node teams who want a framework designed for their stack instead of a translated one.
Consider something else if
A younger ecosystem than the Python incumbents, with correspondingly fewer integrations and less written about it.
Mastra alternatives
The closest options in agent frameworks, on the axes that actually separate them.
| Tool | Best for | Pricing | Runs |
|---|---|---|---|
| Mastraopen source | TypeScript and Node teams who want a framework designed for their stack instead of a translated one. | Open source | Hosted or self-hosted |
| LangChainopen source | Projects that benefit from breadth of integrations, and teams who want explicit stateful graphs via LangGraph. | Open source | Hosted or self-hosted |
| Claude Agent SDKopen source | Filesystem- and shell-shaped agents where the built-in tool set is most of what you need. | Open source | Self-hosted |
| LlamaIndexopen source | Retrieval-heavy applications where document ingestion and indexing are the hard part. | Open source | Hosted or self-hosted |
| Pydantic AIopen source | Python teams already using Pydantic who want type safety and a framework small enough to hold in your head. | Open source | Self-hosted |
| DSPyopen source | Tasks with a measurable metric and enough examples to optimise against, where hand-tuned prompts keep drifting. | Open source | Self-hosted |
Choosing within agent frameworks
Language, honestly
Most of this category is Python-first. If your service is TypeScript, the shortlist is genuinely shorter, and a thin layer over the provider SDK is often better than a half-maintained port.
How much it hides
Some frameworks give you primitives you compose; others give you an agent you configure. The second is faster to a demo and harder to debug at depth. Match this to how much novel behaviour you expect to need.
Questions
What is Mastra?
Mastra is TypeScript-first rather than a port of a Python library, which shows in the ergonomics. It bundles agents, durable workflows, memory, retrieval, and evals in one package, with local development tooling for inspecting runs. It is open source and hosted or self-hosted.
What are the alternatives to Mastra?
The closest alternatives are LangChain, Claude Agent SDK, LlamaIndex, Pydantic AI, DSPy. They sit in the same category — agent frameworks — and differ mainly on hosting model, pricing shape, and how much they abstract away.
Is Mastra the right choice?
TypeScript and Node teams who want a framework designed for their stack instead of a translated one. The main caveat: A younger ecosystem than the Python incumbents, with correspondingly fewer integrations and less written about it.
Whatever you build on, the model is the line item that scales. See what each one costs per million tokens, or price your own workload.