Locally Uncensored vs Msty

Msty Studio positions itself as a private AI workspace for both local and online models. It offers Knowledge Stacks for document RAG, Split Chats for side-by-side model comparison, an MCP Toolbox and a Media Studio for images and video. Msty is closed source, with a free plan and a paid Aurum license for some features.

Locally Uncensored 3.0.6 takes the fully open-source approach with an AGPL-3.0 license. Where Msty centers on a multi-provider workspace, Locally Uncensored makes images and video on your own GPU, adds a coding agent and an agent with built-in tools and your own MCP servers, and works with local engines and cloud providers such as OpenAI and Anthropic side by side.

Feature Comparison

Where Locally Uncensored Wins

• Fully open source: AGPL-3.0 licensed, fully auditable, forkable, and free forever. Msty is closed source, and some features need its paid Aurum license.
• Coding agent: it builds a map of the repo, edits only the lines you asked for, shows the diff before it applies anything, and runs your tests. Msty lists no coding agent.
• Agent tools and MCP: web search and fetch, file operations, shell commands, code execution, screenshots and image and video generation are built in, and your own MCP servers add more. Msty connects MCP servers through its Toolbox.
• Permissions: every tool call passes a permission gate you control, and a read only run stays read only.
• Model load/unload: manually manage VRAM by loading and unloading models on demand.
• Image and video generation: on Windows and Linux the app installs and runs ComfyUI for you, with no node graphs to wire up. On a Mac, Create runs on the Mac itself. Msty's Media Studio makes images and video with models you configure, and the video sources its docs name are online services such as Google Veo.
• No paywall in the app: every feature of the desktop app is free, with no premium tiers inside it. The optional LU Cloud for models too big for a desktop card is paid, and you never need it to use the app.

Version 3.0.6 also brings a Local API that serves your local models on one OpenAI compatible address, phone access over your LAN or a tunnel, and two beta features: Voice, a spoken conversation run on your own machine, and computer control, which is off until you switch it on.

What Locally Uncensored 3.0.7 adds

Version 3.0.7 adds these points that matter next to Msty:

• Several local servers at once: KoboldCpp, LM Studio, a llama.cpp server or any other OpenAI compatible backend each get their own row in Settings, AI Backends, and their models sit in the picker under that name. Adding one no longer pushes another out, and a group chat can mix models from several of them. The context window comes from each server itself. So far this has run in automated tests only, not yet in the app with two real servers.
• Duplicate and branch: Duplicate chat copies a conversation with its persona and settings, Branch from here starts a new chat from any message, and Regenerate keeps the earlier answer as a version you can switch back to. These have run in automated tests only.
• Sampling per persona: a persona can carry its own temperature, top P, top K, min P, max tokens, repeat, presence and frequency penalty and DRY multiplier, also on its seat in a group chat. Values set in the chat still win, and each value only goes to a backend that reads it. Automated tests only so far.
• Character cards: a card as PNG or JSON (versions 1, 2 and 3) becomes a persona with the card picture. A new chat opens with the card's greeting, alternate greetings switch with arrows, and a card persona exports back as a version 2 JSON file. Checked in the app with Holo and Qwen models, not with Gemma.
• ChatGPT export as real chats: the .zip of a ChatGPT data export turns into separate chats with their titles and dates, and a second import adds nothing twice. Tried in the app with an export built in ChatGPT's format; a real export from ChatGPT has not been tried yet.
• Reasoning effort for local models: the Low, Medium, High and Max button next to Think now works on the LU Engine, on LM Studio 0.4.8 and later, on KoboldCpp (Low to High) and on a llama.cpp server whose chat template reads it. It is one setting for all models, and it has run in automated tests only, not against a real LM Studio, KoboldCpp or llama.cpp server. A separate think budget in tokens works with the LU Engine and with Anthropic.

The Settings, Local API page still reaches only the LU Engine, Ollama and LM Studio. Our check of 3.0.7 in the real app ran on one Windows machine.

Where Msty Wins

• Wider provider hub: Msty connects to many online providers next to local models. Locally Uncensored now covers local engines such as Ollama and LM Studio plus OpenAI, Anthropic, OpenRouter, Groq, Together, DeepSeek, Mistral and any OpenAI compatible address, so the gap is smaller than it was.
• Knowledge Stacks: build searchable knowledge from your own documents and chat with it. A useful feature for research and analysis. Locally Uncensored has Document Chat with a local index too.
• Side-by-side comparison: compare responses from different models side by side to evaluate quality. Locally Uncensored has a Compare view and a local benchmark as well.
• Workspace features: reusable prompts, a Context Studio for files, websites and videos, and personas that can work as a crew or watch a chat as a Shadow Persona.
• Images and video from online models: Msty can generate images through providers such as OpenAI or Gemini and video through online sources such as Google Veo, with no local GPU involved.

What this page says about Msty comes from its official website, documentation and terms, as of October 2026.

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