Show HN: LocalGPT – A local-first AI assistant in Rust with persistent memory

github.com

48 points by yi_wang 2 hours ago

I built LocalGPT over 4 nights as a Rust reimagining of the OpenClaw assistant pattern (markdown-based persistent memory, autonomous heartbeat tasks, skills system).

It compiles to a single ~27MB binary — no Node.js, Docker, or Python required.

Key features:

- Persistent memory via markdown files (MEMORY, HEARTBEAT, SOUL markdown files) — compatible with OpenClaw's format - Full-text search (SQLite FTS5) + semantic search (local embeddings, no API key needed) - Autonomous heartbeat runner that checks tasks on a configurable interval - CLI + web interface + desktop GUI - Multi-provider: Anthropic, OpenAI, Ollama etc - Apache 2.0

Install: `cargo install localgpt`

I use it daily as a knowledge accumulator, research assistant, and autonomous task runner for my side projects. The memory compounds — every session makes the next one better.

GitHub: https://github.com/localgpt-app/localgpt Website: https://localgpt.app

Would love feedback on the architecture or feature ideas.

dvt an hour ago

So weird/cool/interesting/cyberpunk that we have stuff like this in the year of our Lord 2026:

   ├── MEMORY.md            # Long-term knowledge (auto-loaded each session)
   ├── HEARTBEAT.md         # Autonomous task queue
   ├── SOUL.md              # Personality and behavioral guidance
Say what you will, but AI really does feel like living in the future. As far as the project is concerned, pretty neat, but I'm not really sure about calling it "local-first" as it's still reliant on an `ANTHROPIC_API_KEY`.

I do think that local-first will end up being the future long-term though. I built something similar last year (unreleased) also in Rust, but it was also running the model locally (you can see how slow/fast it is here[1], keeping in mind I have a 3080Ti and was running Mistral-Instruct).

I need to re-visit this project and release it, but building in the context of the OS is pretty mindblowing, so kudos to you. I think that the paradigm of how we interact with our devices will fundamentally shift in the next 5-10 years.

[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tRrKQl0kzvQ

  • halJordan 29 minutes ago

    You absolutely do not have to use a third party llm. You can point it to any openai/anthropic compatible endpoint. It can even be on localhost.

    • dvt 20 minutes ago

      Ah true, missed that! Still a bit cumbersome & lazy imo, I'm a fan of just shipping with that capability out-of-the-box (Huggingface's Candle is fantastic for downloading/syncing/running models locally).

      • embedding-shape 10 minutes ago

        Ah come on, lazy? As long as it works with the runtime you wanna use, instead of hardcoding their own solution, should work fine. If you want to use Candle and have to implement new architectures with it to be able to use it, you still can, just expose it over HTTP.

applesauce004 34 minutes ago

Can someone explain to me why this needs to connect to LLM providers like OpenAI or Anthropic? I thought it was meant to be a local GPT. Sorry if i misunderstood what this project is trying to do.

Does this mean the inference is remote and only context is local?

  • atmanactive 23 minutes ago

    It doesn't. It has to connect to SOME LLM provider, but that CAN also be local Ollama server (running instance). The choice ALWAYS need to be present since, depending on your use case, Ollama (local machine LLM) could be just right, or it could be completely unusable, in which case you can always switch to data center size LLMs.

    The ReadMe gives only a Antropic version example, but, judging by the source code [1], you can use other providers, including Ollama, just by changing the syntax of that one config file line.

    [1] https://github.com/localgpt-app/localgpt/blob/main/src%2Fage...

ramon156 an hour ago

Pro tip (sorry if these comments are overdone), write your posts and docs yourself (or at least edit them).

Your docs and this post is all written by an LLM, which doesn't reflect much effort.

  • bakugo an hour ago

    > which doesn't reflect much effort.

    I wish this was an effective deterrent against posting low effort slop, but it isn't. Vibe coders are actively proud of the fact that they don't put any effort into the things they claim to have created.

    • g0h0m3 10 minutes ago

      Github repo that is nothing but forks of others projects and some 4chan utilities.

      Professional codependent leveraging anonymity to target others. The internet is a mediocrity factory.

    • problynought 23 minutes ago

      EE with decades of experience here.

      Started my career designing/prototyping expansion cards for telecom blade boards.

      I have built homes from foundation up, rebuilt cars from frame up.

      I have contributed artisanal code from hardware drivers to GUI.

      I have experience with hard things. SWE is not hard, just time-consuming.

      Always a laugh when some non-contributor office worker exploiting sweatshop labor calls others low-effort.

      For years SWEs have been so many layers of abstraction above the machine, SWE has been basic bitch data entry.

      You got used as a political prop/pawn during ZIRP/money printer go brrr era. Womp womp.

      Will keep training/leveraging LLMs and look forward to future hardware that further reduces the need to subject myself to useless middle-man SWEs.

      It's just electrons in a machine. None of the gibberish SaaS conjured up matters.

      • 0_____0 4 minutes ago

        EE with decades of experience here. You have valid points (SWE tedium, LLMs allowing adjacent technical fields to access SW/FW work without involving SWEs) that are completely lost because you're being an asshole for no good reason.

dpweb 16 minutes ago

Made a quick bot app (OC clone). For me I just want to iMessage it - but do not want to give Full Disk rights to terminal (to read the imessage db).

Uses Mlx for local llm on apple silicon. Performance has been pretty good for a basic spec M4 mini.

Nor install the little apps that I don't know what they're doing and reading my chat history and mac system folders.

What I did was create a shortcut on my iphone to write imessages to an iCloud file, which syncs to my mac mini (quick) - and the script loop on the mini to process my messages. It works.

Wonder if others have ideas so I can iMessage the bot, im in iMessage and don't really want to use another app.

theParadox42 an hour ago

I am excited to see more competitors in this space. Openclaw feels like a hot mess with poor abstractions. I got bit by a race condition for the past 36 hours that skipped all of my cron jobs, as did many others before getting fixed. The CLI is also painfully slow for no reason other than it was vibe coded in typescript. And the errors messages are poor and hidden and the TUIs are broken… and the CLI has bad path conventions. All I really want is a nice way to authenticate between various APIs and then let the agent build and manage the rest of its own infrastructure.

dalemhurley 23 minutes ago

I’m am playing with Apple Foundation Models.

AndrewKemendo 40 minutes ago

Properly local too with the llama and onnx format models available! Awesome

I assume I could just adjust the toml to point to deep seek API locally hosted right?