One Python Agent Core, Four Ways to Run It: Nova on Server, Web, TUI, and Desktop

Nova is an open-source personal AI agent runtime that provides a single local workspace for model providers, tools, sessions, memory, MCP, and sub-agents. It addresses the practical problem of starting an agent in one environment and needing the same setup for different environments, such as terminal, web, API, and desktop. Nova achieves this by offering a shared runtime across four interfaces: terminal, web, TUI, and desktop.

The same agent core drives all four surfaces, with only the interface changing. The agent loop, tool registry, and SQLite store remain consistent across all interfaces. The storage location is ~/.nova/, containing config.json, nova.db, logs, skills, workspace, and agents directories. Users can point to a different location using NOVA_HOME if needed.

The web interface features a focused chat composer, workspace selector, and model picker. For frontend development with live reload, run nova serve and cd into the frontend directory to install dependencies and start the development server. The desktop interface hosts the built frontend in a PyWebView window, with the backend running on a background thread.