# OpenWOP vs LangGraph

> Source: https://openwop.dev/comparisons/langgraph/ · OpenWOP, the open-source protocol for multi-agent workflow orchestration.

LangGraph is a library and runtime you write stateful agents in; OpenWOP is an open protocol that defines how a host exposes a durable, interruptible, replayable run of whatever agents it hosts. They solve different problems, and for building one agent application in Python or JavaScript today, LangGraph is the more mature choice.

Checked 4 October 2026. Figures for LangGraph come from its own docs, repository and package registries.

## At a glance

| Property | OpenWOP | LangGraph |
|---|---|---|
| What it is | A wire protocol (REST and Server-Sent Events) plus a conformance suite | A library plus a server runtime ([docs](https://docs.langchain.com/oss/python/langgraph/overview)) |
| Licence | Spec CC BY 4.0, code Apache 2.0 | Library MIT; the Agent Server package is Elastic-2.0, source-available ([PyPI](https://pypi.org/pypi/langgraph-api/json)) |
| Languages | Any language that speaks HTTP; SDKs for TypeScript, Python and Go | Python and JavaScript/TypeScript |
| Where state lives | An append-only event log per run ([events](https://openwop.dev/spec/v2/core/events.html)) | Checkpoints per thread ([persistence](https://docs.langchain.com/oss/python/langgraph/persistence)) |
| Human approval | Interrupts with an approval vocabulary, resumed by token ([interrupt](https://openwop.dev/spec/v2/core/interrupt.html)) | `interrupt()` and `Command(resume=…)` ([docs](https://docs.langchain.com/oss/python/langgraph/interrupts)) |
| Replay and fork | Fork any run from any event; a host that advertises replay must not repeat side effects ([replay](https://openwop.dev/spec/v2/core/replay.html)) | Replay and fork from a checkpoint ([time travel](https://docs.langchain.com/oss/python/langgraph/use-time-travel)) |
| Spec other runtimes implement | Yes, with a public conformance suite; three v2 hosts so far, all run by the project or a sibling organisation | Agent Protocol (OpenAPI); every listed implementation is LangChain's own ([repo](https://github.com/langchain-ai/agent-protocol)) |
| Hosted option | A reference app at [app.openwop.dev](https://app.openwop.dev/) | LangSmith Deployment ([docs](https://docs.langchain.com/langsmith/deployments)) |
| Adoption | New: the spec repo started in May 2026 | About 42,700 GitHub stars and 44 million PyPI downloads in the last month ([pypistats](https://pypistats.org/api/packages/langgraph/recent)) |

## When to choose LangGraph

- You are building one agent application in Python or JavaScript and want to write the agent logic in a framework.
- You want a widely used tool with a large community, a debugger with time travel (LangSmith Studio) and built-in evaluation.
- You want to embed orchestration in your own process with no separate server.

## When OpenWOP fits

- You need several hosts, or several vendors' tools, to agree on what a run is: how it starts, streams, waits for a person, and replays.
- You want approval, fork and replay rules written into a contract that a conformance suite checks, rather than defined by one library's behaviour.
- You are building a runtime yourself and want clients to work against it without custom integration.

Be clear about OpenWOP's stage: it is months old, has one steward, and no independent organisation has implemented a host yet.

## Using them together

An OpenWOP node can run any code, so a LangGraph agent could run inside a workflow step, and an OpenWOP host could call a deployed LangGraph agent over A2A, which both support. Neither integration has been built or tested yet.

## Common questions

### Is OpenWOP a LangGraph alternative?

Only partly. LangGraph is where you write agents; OpenWOP is the contract a host exposes for running them, so you could write a step's agent logic with LangGraph or anything else.

### Doesn't Agent Protocol already standardise agent runs?

It standardises runs, threads and a store over OpenAPI, and LangGraph implements a superset. OpenWOP also specifies interrupts, fork semantics with side-effect suppression and a conformance suite, though it also has no independent host yet.

### Can LangGraph time travel do what OpenWOP fork does?

Both let you go back to an earlier point and run again. OpenWOP's distinguishing rule is that a replay must not perform external side effects a second time; we found no equivalent documented guarantee in LangGraph as of this check.

## Sources

- [LangGraph overview](https://docs.langchain.com/oss/python/langgraph/overview), [persistence](https://docs.langchain.com/oss/python/langgraph/persistence), [interrupts](https://docs.langchain.com/oss/python/langgraph/interrupts), [time travel](https://docs.langchain.com/oss/python/langgraph/use-time-travel)
- [LangGraph licence](https://github.com/langchain-ai/langgraph/blob/main/LICENSE), [langgraph-api on PyPI](https://pypi.org/pypi/langgraph-api/json)
- [Agent Protocol](https://github.com/langchain-ai/agent-protocol), [LangSmith Deployment](https://docs.langchain.com/langsmith/deployments)
- OpenWOP: [runs](https://openwop.dev/spec/v2/core/runs.html), [events](https://openwop.dev/spec/v2/core/events.html), [interrupt](https://openwop.dev/spec/v2/core/interrupt.html), [replay](https://openwop.dev/spec/v2/core/replay.html), [conformance](https://openwop.dev/conformance/)