AgentsAutonomy & tool use
Julian Goldie's 'Hermes Apollo' adds a branded voice layer to Hermes Agent's Voice Mode inside a paid Agent OS bundle
A creator-built voice agent called Hermes Apollo, sold inside a paid Agent OS bundle, runs on the Voice Mode that Nous Research added to its open-source Hermes Agent in August 2026, plus extras such as screen sharing and Obsidian-based shared memory.
From the r/AISEOInsider (via last30days) article of October 17, 2026 and cited sources: 'Apollo' is not a Nous Research product name. [4] [7] [8]
SOURCES[4] AI Tools Review: Hermes Agent Apollo voice mode aitoolsreview.co.uk[7] Runtime Wire: Hermes Agent v0.20.0 voice and A2A runtimewire.com[8] AI Success Lab: Hermes Apollo Voice aisuccesslabjuliangoldie.com
AT Pulse research deskPublished · Updated · 5 min read · AI-assisted analysisAI-assisted, not human-edited. Methodology Corrections Who owns this site
- Original source
- r/AISEOInsider (via last30days) article, independent perspective
- Brief by
- AT Pulse research desk AI-assisted; publisher and contact on the desk page
- When
- October 17, 2026 article published
- Covered
- Oct 17 edition
- Evidence
- 10 sources across 8 sites
- 1Is the Hermes Apollo Voice Agent Really Like JARVIS? My Testreddit.com
- 2Hermes Agent Apollo: Voice AI Agent Runs Your Dayreddit.com
- 3Linked video: Is the Hermes Apollo Voice Agent Really Like…youtube.com
- 4AI Tools Review: Hermes Agent Apollo voice modeaitoolsreview.co.uk
- 5Fast.io: Hermes Agent review 2026fast.io
- 6NousResearch/hermes-agent (GitHub)github.com
QuietHow it’s measured
YouTube video · 92 views · 2 likes
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'Apollo' is not a Nous Research product name. It is Julian Goldie's label for Hermes Agent's Voice Mode, which arrived in v0.20.0 with streaming conversational voice and on-device wake words. Goldie's own guide describes Apollo as shorthand for that feature. [4] [7] [8]
The open-source framework supports voice through push-to-talk in the CLI, Telegram voice memos and Discord voice channels. The video's other features come only with the paid bundle: screen sharing, a background mode, saved voice-chat history and a pixel office of agents. Its cross-agent memory is also bundle-only. It works by having several agents read and write one Obsidian folder of notes, which is separate from Hermes' built-in persistent memory. [3] [6] [9]
The video's technical claims don't match the documentation. It says Apollo uses the ChatGPT CLI rather than an API, but Goldie's guide describes swappable speech-to-text and text-to-speech engines, many of them cloud APIs. AI Tools Review treats 'instant' replies as marketing language and estimates under two seconds to first audio only in the best configuration. [3] [4] [8]
The core voice pipeline is free and open source, and the bundle adds packaging and integrations. Latency depends on which speech engines and model are used, so teams should measure time to first audio themselves rather than rely on 'instant' claims.
Executive brief
"Hermes Apollo" isn't a Nous Research product. It's the name creator Julian Goldie gives to a voice layer in his paid "Agent OS" bundle. Nous Research's own documentation calls the feature Voice Mode, and Hermes Agent added it on August 3, 2026 (AI Tools Review). The "My Test" video is narrated by "the digital avatar of Maeve" (00:15), and it promotes a paid community. The video also says Apollo uses the ChatGPT CLI rather than an API. That conflicts with Goldie's own guide, which describes a standard speech-to-text and text-to-speech engine pipeline. No independent tests of the JARVIS-like claims were found.
What changed and event timeline
Hermes Agent launches
Nous Research released Hermes Agent, an open-source agent runtime under the MIT license. One review reports it passed 95,000 GitHub stars within seven weeks (;).
v0.20.0 adds voice
The release added streaming conversational voice, on-device wake words and a protocol for agents to talk to other agents ().
v0.21.1 patch
This was a large reliability and performance release. AI Tools Review argues it got less attention than it deserved ().
"Apollo" shown to be unofficial
AI Tools Review found that the name "Apollo" does not appear anywhere in the official Hermes repository. It treats Goldie's earlier Apollo video as a rebrand of Voice Mode, not a new launch ().
Goldie's own guide agrees
Goldie's blog says Apollo is shorthand for Voice Mode and lists the speech-to-text and text-to-speech engines behind it ().
Reddit post and video
The post and its linked video claim instant replies, the ability to see your screen, and memory shared through Obsidian (;).
Capabilities and access
- Base: Hermes Agent, open source and self-hosted (GitHub). Voice arrived in v0.20.0 and later patches built on it. No Apollo-specific version number exists.
- Official voice support: push-to-talk in the CLI, voice memos on Telegram, and live Discord voice channels (Fast.io voice guide).
- Bundle-only features shown in the video: screen sharing, a pop-up panel, background mode, saved voice-chat history (01:56), and a "pixel office" of agents.
Read the full section
- Base: Hermes Agent, open source and self-hosted (GitHub). Voice arrived in v0.20.0 and later patches built on it. No Apollo-specific version number exists.
- Official voice support: push-to-talk in the CLI, voice memos on Telegram, and live Discord voice channels (Fast.io voice guide).
- Bundle-only features shown in the video: screen sharing, a pop-up panel, background mode, saved voice-chat history (01:56), and a "pixel office" of agents.
- Access: Agent OS is sold as a zip file inside the paid AI Profit Boardroom (03:08).
Technical analysis for researchers and developers
- Voice pipeline: speech-to-text, then the normal Hermes tool-calling loop, then text-to-speech.
- Engines: local Whisper or cloud options such as Groq and OpenAI for speech-to-text.
- Memory: Hermes has persistent memory, searchable past sessions and skills it writes itself (GitHub).
Read the full section
- Voice pipeline: speech-to-text, then the normal Hermes tool-calling loop, then text-to-speech. Speech is streamed back sentence by sentence while the reply is still being generated (AI Tools Review).
- Engines: local Whisper or cloud options such as Groq and OpenAI for speech-to-text. Edge TTS is the free default for speech output, with ElevenLabs and others as paid options. Settings live in
~/.hermes/config.yaml(AI Success Lab). - Memory: Hermes has persistent memory, searchable past sessions and skills it writes itself (GitHub). The video's cross-agent memory is a separate layer in Goldie's bundle: several agents read and write one Obsidian folder of notes (06:24).
- Reproducibility: the bundle's code isn't public, and no latency figures or benchmarks were published.
Claims and evidence
- "Replies instantly" (01:37): AI Tools Review calls this marketing language. It estimates under two seconds to first audio only in the best configuration.
- "Doesn't run through an API. No source corroborates the CLI claim.
- Screen description (04:25): a single demo by the vendor, not checked by anyone else.
Read the full section
- "Replies instantly" (01:37): AI Tools Review calls this marketing language. It estimates under two seconds to first audio only in the best configuration.
- "Doesn't run through an API; uses the ChatGPT CLI" (01:45): Goldie's own guide describes pluggable engines, many of them cloud APIs, and doesn't mention the ChatGPT CLI (AI Success Lab). No source corroborates the CLI claim.
- Screen description (04:25): a single demo by the vendor, not checked by anyone else.
- Framework figures differ by source:
- Tools: the video says 40+, matching the GitHub README; Fast.io says 70+.
- Messaging platforms: the video says 15+; Fast.io says 20+.
Context and prior work
Hermes Agent is often compared with OpenClaw as a self-hosted agent that's always running (HackerNoon). Using Obsidian folders as shared memory is a common pattern among builders, not a Hermes feature. The video also mentions "Opus 5.5" and a one-click switch to Claude (06:15), so the underlying model can be swapped. That means voice quality depends on whichever model and engines the user picks.
Limitations, safety and contested findings
- Fast.io's review reports three limits:
- Memory files are capped at about 3,500 characters in total.
- About 73% of each API call is fixed overhead.
Read the full section
- Fast.io's review reports three limits:
- Memory files are capped at about 3,500 characters in total.
- About 73% of each API call is fixed overhead.
- Self-learning has to be configured by hand.
- It also reports no Hermes-specific security flaws (CVEs) through April 2026, and that v0.13.0 added secret redaction and scanning for prompt injection (Fast.io).
- Screen sharing combined with tool execution, and a vault every agent can write to, widen the risk from prompt injection. None of the reviewed sources evaluates this in the Agent OS bundle.
- The "test" is promotional content narrated by an avatar, with no stated method.
Business and practitioner implications
- The useful part is available free: install
hermes-agent[voice]and choose your engines (Fast.io voice guide). - If speed matters, measure time to first audio with your own speech-to-text and text-to-speech choices instead of relying on "instant."
- Shared Obsidian memory is cheap to set up, but control who can write to it.
Read the full section
- The useful part is available free: install
hermes-agent[voice]and choose your engines (Fast.io voice guide). - If speed matters, measure time to first audio with your own speech-to-text and text-to-speech choices instead of relying on "instant."
- Shared Obsidian memory is cheap to set up, but control who can write to it.
- Fast.io's verdict: Hermes suits solo developers and small teams, not customer-facing enterprise systems.
- Treat paid bundles as packaging around open-source parts, not as a new capability.
The source trail.
Sources (10)
Is the Hermes Apollo Voice Agent Really Like JARVIS? My Test
Feed excerpt only. A transcript of the video linked from this page is supplied (linked video auto captions; https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PXCojZ37QRg); automatic text may contain errors.
reddit.comHermes Agent Apollo: Voice AI Agent Runs Your Day
Related coverage; assess separately
reddit.comLinked video: Is the Hermes Apollo Voice Agent Really Like JARVIS? My Test
linked video auto captions
www.youtube.com