Compare · Glean

Halyard vs Glean.

Glean is the best enterprise search chat app in the category. Halyard is the context layer your agents grind against every time they run. Different surfaces. Often complementary.

TL;DR
Glean

The right choice for large enterprises that want a single, permissions-enforced search UI across every SaaS app. Glean is where humans go to ask, and the answer is a chat response grounded in indexed content. Mature, expensive, enterprise-scaled.

Halyard

The right choice for teams running Claude, Codex, Cursor — or all three — who want those agents to stop guessing. Halyard is the layer underneath the AI tools your team already uses, and it routes to a human when the answer isn't written down. Team-priced. Minutes to set up.

When each wins

Different problems.
Different buyers.

Pick Glean when…

  • You're a large enterprise with a 100+ SaaS stack and need permissions-enforced search across all of it.
  • Your team's preferred entry point is a unified chat/search UI, not an AI tool.
  • You have budget for a six-figure contract and a dedicated admin to tune it.
  • Compliance certifications (SOC2, HIPAA) are procurement-critical.

Pick Halyard when…

  • Your team's AI tools — Claude, Copilot, Cursor — are the primary consumers of your knowledge.
  • A lot of your real knowledge lives in Slack threads, not indexed docs.
  • You want agents to escalate to a human when the answer isn't written down, and capture the reply.
  • You want to be running this week, not next quarter.
Use them together

Glean is the search UI your humans reach for. Halyard is the context layer your agents grind against. Many teams will want both — Glean for the "I need to find something" workflow, Halyard for the "my AI tool just needs to know" workflow. They read from overlapping sources but serve different users.

Side by side

Feature by feature.

An honest row-by-row read. "Depends" means the answer hinges on your team shape, not the product.

Feature Glean Halyard Winner
Primary user surface Glean — a unified chat/search UI your team logs into Whatever AI tool your team already uses — Claude, Codex, Cursor, ChatGPT Halyard
Integration breadth 100+ connectors (Slack, Salesforce, Workday, Jira, Confluence, GitHub, Box, Zendesk…) Focused core (Slack, Notion, GitHub, Drive, Linear, Granola) — designed for the agent-native stack Glean
Permissions enforcement Best-in-class — source-native ACL enforcement across every connector Inherits source permissions; simpler model, less mature for deep enterprise compliance Glean
Captures live work signals Indexes Slack/docs read-only — what was written becomes searchable Captures Slack expert replies as durable, attributed knowledge entries — not just indexed Halyard
Routes questions to the right human Not part of the product Agent asks → Halyard finds the right expert in Slack → reply becomes durable knowledge Halyard
Pricing model ~$45–50/user/month + $15/user for advanced AI, 100–250 seat minimums, $50K–$100K+ annual commits Team-priced, no enterprise minimum, no hidden POC or support fees Halyard
Deployment + time to value Weeks to months: connectors, permissions review, content tuning, admin onboarding Minutes: install the MCP, point it at Slack + your docs, your agents get grounded Halyard
Enterprise polish Mature — SOC2, HIPAA options, dedicated CSM, role-based admin controls Earlier stage — SOC2 in progress, fewer enterprise compliance bells Glean
How they fit together

Keep Glean. Add Halyard.

If you already have Glean, you've already done the hard work of connecting your SaaS stack. Halyard complements it by grounding the agents your team runs — in parallel, not in conflict.

1

Glean stays the search UI your team logs into.

"Who owns this?", "What did we decide?" — Glean's answer surface is untouched.

2

Halyard connects to the same sources via MCP.

Slack, Notion, GitHub, Drive, Linear — your agents now retrieve grounded context inside Claude, Codex, Cursor.

3

Humans stay in Glean, agents stay in Halyard.

Two entry points, one source of truth. No double-paying for overlapping features — each tool carries the workflow it's best at.

Ground your agents without replacing your search UI.

Halyard pairs with Glean. Team-priced. Minutes to wire up.