The Hermes Pixel Office is a free, open source dashboard that turns every one of your Hermes agents into a pixel character sitting at a desk, so you can watch them work in real time.
It comes from Teknium, one of the people behind Nous Research — the same team that builds Hermes Agent.
There is nothing to sign up for and nothing to unlock.
This guide covers what it is, how to set it up in the browser or in VS Code, what every character and animation means, how the approval flags work, and the four tips worth knowing before you install it.
What is the Hermes Pixel Office?
It is a live visual dashboard for Hermes agents.
Every agent session becomes a pixel character in a shared cartoon office.
You watch them walk in through the door, sit down, get to work, and then stand up and walk back out when they finish.
That is it. You read the whole state of your system at a glance, like looking through a window into a real room.
It is free and open source, built by Teknium at Nous Research — the same team behind Hermes Agent itself.
The problem it solves
Hermes agents normally work in the background.
They run tools. They spin up helper agents. They get real work done.
And you cannot see any of it.
You hit go, then you sit staring at a blinking cursor and a wall of scrolling text, with no idea whether the agents are working, stuck, or already finished.
The Pixel Office takes all of that invisible activity and draws it.
For me that matters more than most, because my whole agent OS runs on Hermes — Hermes is the brain behind the entire thing. So when I open the Pixel Office, I am watching my own agent OS work, live, in one little room.
How to set it up
There are two ways to run it, and you get the same office either way.
Option 1 — in your browser. Open it as its own page. This is the simplest route and it fits how most people already work, since you are in a browser all day anyway.
Option 2 — in VS Code. Drop it straight into VS Code and the office sits in a panel right next to your code while you work. You also get a "+ agent" button that starts a fresh Hermes run without you ever leaving the editor.
Before you connect anything, use demo mode. It ships with a demo that fills the office with pretend agents so you can see how the whole thing looks and moves before wiring up your real setup. It is the fastest way to learn what every character means, and it takes minutes.
Remote setups work out of the box. If you run your agent OS on a server somewhere, like I do, you still get the office on your own screen with no extra wrestling to set it up.
How to read the characters
Every agent session is one character. It does not matter where the session came from — the command line, a chat app, or a job you set to run on a schedule. They all show up as their own little person walking in.
Helper agents wear a gold collar and a name tag. These are the sub-agents a bigger agent spins up to handle a side task, and the name tag shows their job. So the second you look, you know who is the main worker and who is a helper it pulled in.
An empty desk means the job is done. When an agent finishes, it stands up and walks out the door.
What each animation means
The characters act out what they are doing, so you never have to read a log line to know what is going on.
| What you see | What the agent is doing |
|---|---|
| Character typing | Writing a file |
| Little book open | Reading something |
| Browsing animation | Browsing the web |
| Green monitor flicker | Running something in the terminal |
| Red exclamation mark | Waiting for your approval |
| Stands up and walks out | Task finished |
You just look at the room.
How the approval flags work
Sometimes an agent hits a command that could be risky, and it needs you to say yes or no before it goes ahead.
In the Pixel Office, that agent throws up a bright red exclamation mark over its head.
The top of the screen shows a counter — something like "2 waiting".
So instead of scrolling through walls of text trying to work out whether anything is stuck waiting on you, you glance over and see exactly who needs you.
There is also an optional chime. It dings when an agent needs your okay, or when a helper finishes its job. It is off by default — flip it on and you do not even have to be looking at the screen.
One shared office for every agent
Every Hermes agent running on your machine shares the same office.
So if you have a few different things going at once, they all pile into one room together.
One window, your whole team.
What it does not do
This is the one thing most people get wrong about it.
When people see a live dashboard like this, they assume it slows their agents down, or gets in the way, or drags on them under the hood.
It does not.
The Pixel Office is a window and nothing more. It watches what your agents are already doing and draws it out for you. It never blocks them, never changes their work, and never adds any weight to how they run. Your agents do not even know it is there.
It is also not a controller. Keep your agents' own safety rules turned on — the red flag just tells you when to look, and you are still the one who says yes or no to anything risky.
🔥 Want this exact setup running on your own machine?
Inside the AI Profit Boardroom you get the full Agent OS zip ready to install — the same setup I run with Hermes as the brain, so the Pixel Office plugs straight in. Plus a 30-day roadmap, step-by-step Hermes and Pixel Office walkthroughs, and four live coaching calls every week with 4,000+ members.
Three ways I use it
Watching a content series get built. I kicked off a batch of Hermes agents inside my agent OS to draft hooks, scripts and captions. In the office I watched each helper pop up as a gold-collared character — one typing away, one reading through notes, all working at the same time. When one hit a step that needed my okay, the red flag appeared over its head, so I knew the exact second to step in.
Checking a member onboarding flow. I had agents lay out the welcome messages, first-call prep and resource walkthroughs. I watched each character finish its task and walk out the door, which told me at one glance that the whole flow was done and nothing was silently stuck.
Running a lead generation system. I fire off a group of agents to plan the content, the hooks and the follow-ups, then watch the office fill up. At a glance I know which are still working, which finished and left, and which one is waiting on me — the whole thing from one small screen instead of ten open tabs.
It does not do the work for me. It finally lets me see the work.
Four tips before you install it
One — try the demo before you wire anything up. Learn what every character means on pretend agents first.
Two — if you live in VS Code, put it there. Same office in a panel next to your code, plus the "+ agent" button for starting a fresh Hermes run without leaving the editor.
Three — remember it is a window, not a controller. Keep your agents' own safety rules on.
Four — it works over a remote connection out of the box. Server-hosted agent OS, office on your own screen, no extra setup.
Who it is for
If you run one agent occasionally, you probably do not need it.
If you run batches of agents with helper agents underneath them, it turns an unreadable wall of text into something you can supervise in a second.
And if your whole operating system runs on Hermes, like mine does, it is the missing window into your own business.
FAQ
What is the Hermes Pixel Office? A free, open source visual dashboard from Teknium at Nous Research that shows every Hermes agent as a pixel character working in a shared cartoon office.
How do I set it up? Two ways: open it in your browser as its own page, or drop it into VS Code so it sits in a panel next to your code. Try demo mode first to learn what everything means.
Does it slow my agents down? No. It is a window, not a controller — it only draws what your agents are already doing, and it never blocks or changes their work.
How do I tell helper agents apart? Helper agents get a gold collar and a name tag showing their job, so main workers and helpers are obvious at a glance.
How do I know when an agent needs approval? A bright red exclamation mark appears over that character, a counter at the top shows how many are waiting, and there is an optional chime you can switch on.
Does it work on a remote server? Yes, over a remote connection out of the box.
About Julian
I'm Julian Goldie — AI entrepreneur, SEO expert, and founder of the AI Profit Boardroom (4,000+ members). I help business owners scale with AI agents, automation, and SEO.
- 400K+ YouTube subscribers
- 7-figure AI agency (Goldie Agency)
- Daily training inside the Boardroom
- Author of multiple AI automation playbooks
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The Hermes Pixel Office is a free open little office where you finally get to see your AI team work, instead of staring at text and hoping for the best.
