Launch HN: SIM Studio (YC X25) – Figma-Like Canvas for Agent Workflows

53 points by waleedlatif1 3 days ago

Hey HN! We're Emir and Waleed from Sim Studio (https://simstudio.ai). We did a Show HN a few weeks ago about our open-source project (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43823096). Today, we’re launching our hosted platform—a collaborative interface to build and deploy agent workflows. We just removed the waitlist (with 5,000+ people) and you can sign up and access it at: https://simstudio.ai

Sim Studio lets you build agents with different models, tools, and custom functions. In minutes, you can deploy a research agent. Demo here - https://youtu.be/F6MqNvnfxbI

We started working on Sim Studio because we were frustrated with agent frameworks that required excessive boilerplate code and unhelpful abstractions (like agent roles and backstories). We also tried other visual interfaces, but found them difficult to set up and too limited for production use cases. Specifically, we wanted the ability to write custom functions, force tool calls, and run parallel execution.

We’re taking a different approach. Our visual canvas lets you explicitly define how agents interact, use external tools, and handle complex logic like branching, loops, and conditional execution. You can seamlessly integrate with popular tools like Supabase, Pinecone, Mem0, and Exa without obscure abstractions.

You can simulate workflow runs, deploy workflows as APIs or standalone chat interfaces, and trigger them via webhooks. We offer built-in observability, detailed trace spans, and logs that make debugging straightforward. Try searching yourself below:

Example message for https://hn.simstudio.ai:

- Search [person] from [company] - "Search Emir Karabeg from Sim Studio"

Check out our Apache 2.0 licensed repo at https://github.com/simstudioai/sim, explore our docs at https://docs.simstudio.ai, or try out our deployed chat from the demo video here: https://hn.simstudio.ai.

We’d love to hear your feedback! Do you think our visual solution is a good approach to building agents?

matt3D - 3 days ago

The one thing I find a bit odd about a lot of these orchestration tools is that they aren't AI first on their own UX.

Surely the first thing I should be presented with is a prompt window that can help be scaffold out the orchestration.

ekarabeg - 3 days ago

Thanks for the suggestion! We're adding in a prompt to workflow this week.

jasongill - 3 days ago

It would be great to see how this compares (why it's better, or what it does differently) to the myriad of competitors in this space - from established players like n8n adding 'AI' features, to AI-specific workflow tools like Rivet, to AI libraries adding visual designers like Langflow.

Site looks great!

waleedlatif1 - 3 days ago

thank you! We believe Sim Studio is different because we built it from the ground up to be ai-native - not an automation tool that bolted on ai features as an afterthought
A few points on this:
- Super intuitive & highly configurable visual canvas where there are no abstractions over the model providers' parameters
- Seamlessly works with the dev tools everyone uses (supabase, pinecone, mem0, exa)
- Handles complexities like branching, loops, and concurrency by default
- Built-in debugging that actually makes sense (with trace spans and logs)
- Actually open source (apache 2.0)
- bfeynman - 3 days ago
  
  There is nothing about this that you can call it "ai-native" -its just another visual editor (amongst which i've seen like 5+ from YC).

srameshc - 3 days ago

I like the product. But I have a feedback: Your homepage doesn't exactly help understand your product. Your github has a GIF that describes your product better, so you should consider having something like that describes your product better on your website.

waleedlatif1 - 3 days ago

thanks for the feedback, will add the demo directly to the website!

primitivesuave - 3 days ago

Congratulations on the public launch!

I had the honor of meeting these founders in person, and was pretty inspired by how fast these guys ship features and iterate on the product with their customers. Definitely the best React Flow work I've ever seen!

waleedlatif1 - 3 days ago

thank you! appreciate the kind words

flaviuspopan - 3 days ago

Lovely! I’ll give this a shot soon. Two questions: 1. Pricing - I presume y’all will eventually charge for hosting like n8n? I’m feeling a bit sheepish trying a new service without any mention of price. Even mentioning a free tier would be nice to see.

2. Any plans for integrating MCP servers? I’m looking to build a WhatsApp based Text to SQL service and this seems like a solid fit, but I’d like to use an MCP server that groks the business domain to query supabase. Any suggestions on how to pull this off?

waleedlatif1 - 3 days ago

appreciate it!
1) we are completely open source and you can self-host it if you so please. for the hosted platform, we have a free tier to let you tinker and get some free inference credits, and then we have a pro plan with is $20 worth of inference, team plan with $40. we only charge for inference, not to use the platform
2) we are planning on integrating with MCP servers, although hesitatn because its a newer protocol and may not be here to stay (might be a hot take). in the meantime, we have pre-built integrations for whatsapp & supabase, so you can definitely build this out today

manish_sg - 2 days ago

Does SimStudio support embedding within a SaaS under the hosted version? Or is it not meant for multi tenanted deployments?

worldsayshi - 3 days ago

I think that "Figma/Excalidraw-like" canvas for <insert interesting problem domain here> is an underrated solution space. At least in terms of variation on the problem domain.

jerejacobson - 3 days ago

I agree, I especially find it useful when prototyping. I recently built a canvas node-based tool that connects LLM prompts and passes the model's response into the next node as context. It was fun to create and great for testing/comparing outputs from different models. https://littleworkflow.com/
- ekarabeg - 3 days ago
  
  That's awesome! I like the visual rendering on the canvas.
  - jerejacobson - 3 days ago
    
    Thanks! I will definitely try out Sim Studio later today. It looks great, nice work!
swyx - 3 days ago

(should add TLdraw which is specifically built for extensibility)
no, it is overrated. there are many many canvas workflow builders like this one. they're all beautiful, intuitive and easy to use. they all also dont get traction. go ahead, name one that everyone else here will know. its weird but theres a huge gulf here between what people think they want and what people really use outside the figma/excalidraw/tldraw/miro/canva space
- waleedlatif1 - 3 days ago
  
  we bet that its just because they pre-dated LLMs and don't really allow for granular control. the goal is to make it easier to develop automations/workflows, not harder. we think the future of development is 90% transformations/routing/fallbacks (boring) and the only part that actually impacts the end result is the call to the LLM (fun), the tools you give it, and a memory component. if we abstract away all the boring stuff, and only leave the stuff that impacts the results then it makes iterating and building with AI much faster and easier.
  - swyx - 2 days ago
    
    good luck (genuine)
ekarabeg - 3 days ago

We believe a visual solution is the best way for developers — and LLMs — to build applications in the future.

barbazoo - 3 days ago

It would be nice to see the examples populated with real life examples.

ekarabeg - 3 days ago

Try out https://hn.simstudio.ai for a live example, but we're also releasing templates this week to see community workflows.
- tsumnia - 3 days ago
  
  I think OP is more referring to examples on how to set a workflow, like what would the equivalent "Hello World" / "FizzBuzz" / "Send an alert notification to [location] if [condition]". We're still trying to identify when and where using an agent is beneficial, so some use cases that I can review and fiddle with to match my workflow will help.
  Really cool platform, so I'm interested in using it!
  - waleedlatif1 - 3 days ago
    
    adding some examples and templates this week, and in our discord we are gonna maintain a showcase where ppl can post the cool workflows they've built.
waleedlatif1 - 3 days ago

thanks for the feedback, we are launching a ton of templates on the platform this week that you can add to your workspace with a single click. also, we'll add some examples to the home page

efitz - 3 days ago

Looks like IFTTT for LLM agents :-)

waleedlatif1 - 3 days ago

i like to think of us as the version of these automation platforms that doesn't make you hardcode in all the non-determinism & edge cases, because now we can just use llms :)

Geep5 - 3 days ago

I love this space, been really enjoying Rivet which is open source and free. It's made coding a joy.

diamondfist25 - 3 days ago

Can you share this project you are referring to?
- Maxious - 3 days ago
  
  https://github.com/Ironclad/rivet
  - waleedlatif1 - 3 days ago
    
    i think it significantly lowers the bar for entry to building agentic workflows, but also has the potential to augment the development process for engineers since its such a tight feedback loop. for instance, we were working on a sales & marketing ai tool before this and iterating was so hard because the agent frameworks are finicky, and rolling our own multi-agent orchestration means we are locked into a single provider. on sim studio, you can switch providers and tools instantly without any switching cost

benedictowusu - 3 days ago

[flagged]

matt3D - 3 days ago

Did you use SIM studio to set up this AI spam bot?