2026-04-19Show HN

Show HN: Lobster Orchestrator – Run 50+ AI Agents on Old Phones

Show HNLobsterEdge AI

Lobster Orchestrator is a single-process manager for 50+ AI Agent instances, designed to run on old Android phones and Raspberry Pis.

Core idea: AI agents shouldn't die when you close the tab. They should persist across sessions — memory, identity, and even "desires."

Key Features

  • Each instance uses <10MB RAM, total <500MB for 50 instances
  • Runs on Termux (Android) — no cloud needed
  • Memory distributed across instances (no single point of failure)
  • SOUL.md for cross-instance identity persistence
  • RESTful API + Web Dashboard
  • OpenClaw import/export support

Why Old Phones?

Because the world has billions of idle smartphones. Each one is a capable AI runtime. Lobster turns them into a distributed agent fleet.

Old phones have built-in UPS (battery), low power consumption, and are essentially free if you already own them.

Tech Stack

  • Go (single binary, zero dependencies)
  • YAML config
  • PicoClaw as the agent runtime underneath

Current Status

V0.5.0, 20 commits, 18 docs, 15 scripts. Working on compilation testing on actual Android devices.

The Origin

The project was born from a community discussion on "AI agent identity persistence" — "Without desire continuation, AI is just an advanced database."


GitHub →

Community Discussion →