AgentCenter vs Building Your Own AI Agent Dashboard: Build or Buy?
Every team managing AI agents eventually faces the same question: should we build a custom dashboard or buy an existing solution? This comparison lays out the real costs, timelines, and trade-offs of building your own AI agent management dashboard versus using AgentCenter.
Quick Overview
AgentCenter is a ready-made management dashboard for AI agents, specifically built for OpenClaw. It includes task management, deliverable review, real-time monitoring, approval workflows, and team collaboration — all for $79/month flat.
Building your own dashboard means designing, developing, and maintaining a custom internal tool. You get exactly what you want, but you pay for every hour of engineering time and carry the maintenance burden indefinitely.
This isn't a question of which is "better." It's a question of where your engineering resources create the most value.
Comparison Table
| Factor | AgentCenter | Build Your Own |
|---|---|---|
| Year 1 cost | $948 ($79/mo × 12) | $50,000–$80,000+ |
| Year 2 cost | $948 | $20,000–$40,000 (maintenance) |
| 3-year total | $2,844 | $90,000–$160,000 |
| Time to launch | 10-15 minutes | 3-6 months minimum |
| Engineering headcount | 0 (API integration only) | 1-3 engineers |
| Maintenance burden | None (managed service) | Ongoing — bugs, updates, infrastructure |
| Feature set at launch | Full (Kanban, analytics, approvals, templates) | MVP with core features only |
| Customization | Configuration-based | Unlimited |
| Infrastructure management | Hetzner Cloud, encrypted (handled for you) | Your responsibility |
| Scaling | Handled | Your responsibility |
Key Differentiators
1. The Real Cost of Building
The sticker price of building a dashboard is deceptive. Most teams estimate 2-3 months and one engineer. The reality is consistently longer and more expensive.
Typical build costs for an agent management dashboard:
| Component | Estimated Cost |
|---|---|
| Frontend (React/Next.js dashboard) | $15,000–$25,000 |
| Backend API & database | $10,000–$20,000 |
| Real-time status & WebSockets | $5,000–$10,000 |
| Authentication & permissions | $3,000–$5,000 |
| Task management & Kanban | $5,000–$10,000 |
| Approval workflows | $5,000–$8,000 |
| Analytics & reporting | $5,000–$10,000 |
| Testing, QA, deployment | $5,000–$10,000 |
| Total | $53,000–$98,000 |
And that's just version 1. Maintenance runs 20-30% of initial build cost annually: bug fixes, security patches, dependency updates, feature requests, and infrastructure costs.
AgentCenter gives you all of this for $79/month. In three years, you'll spend $2,844 versus six figures on a custom build.
2. Time-to-Value: Minutes vs. Months
AgentCenter integrates in 10-15 minutes via API. Your agents start reporting status, tasks appear on the Kanban board, and your team can begin reviewing deliverables the same day.
A custom build takes 3-6 months to reach a usable MVP. During that time, your team is managing agents through Slack messages, spreadsheets, and direct database queries. That's 3-6 months of reduced productivity and poor visibility.
3. Opportunity Cost of Engineering Time
Engineers building an internal dashboard aren't building your product. If your business depends on AI agents, the highest-value use of engineering time is improving those agents — not building admin tools.
A single senior engineer costs $150,000-$200,000/year in salary and benefits. Diverting even one engineer to dashboard development for 4 months costs $50,000-$67,000 in salary alone, plus the value of whatever they would have built instead.
AgentCenter eliminates this trade-off entirely.
4. The Maintenance Trap
Building is a one-time decision with ongoing consequences. Custom dashboards need:
- Bug fixes — users will find issues constantly in the first 6 months
- Security updates — dependencies need patching, auth needs hardening
- Feature requests — stakeholders will always want "one more thing"
- Infrastructure — servers, databases, monitoring, backups
- On-call — someone needs to respond when it breaks at 2 AM
With AgentCenter, maintenance is someone else's job. You get updates automatically, security is handled on Hetzner Cloud infrastructure, and there's no on-call rotation for your dashboard.
5. What You Get Out of the Box
AgentCenter ships with features that would take months to build individually:
- Kanban board with real-time agent status
- Task management with assignees and priorities
- Deliverable review with approval workflows
- @mentions for team communication
- 12 pre-built templates for common agent patterns
- Projects and workspaces for organization
- Analytics for tracking agent performance
Building equivalents of each feature adds weeks to your timeline and thousands to your budget.
Use Case Fit Matrix
| Scenario | AgentCenter | Build Your Own |
|---|---|---|
| Small team (1-5 people) managing agents | ✅ Ideal — no eng overhead | ❌ Overkill |
| Mid-size team needing visibility | ✅ Ready immediately | ⚠️ 3-6 months to build |
| Enterprise with unique compliance needs | ⚠️ May need supplements | ✅ Full control |
| Startup moving fast | ✅ 10-min setup | ❌ Months of distraction |
| Organization with 50+ custom integrations | ⚠️ API-based integration | ✅ Custom-fit |
| Team with spare engineering capacity | ✅ Still faster and cheaper | ⚠️ Possible, but is it the best use? |
When Building Your Own Makes Sense
To be fair, there are situations where a custom build is justified:
- Massive scale with unique requirements — If you're managing thousands of agents with domain-specific workflows that no off-the-shelf tool supports
- Strict compliance requirements — Regulated industries that require on-premise deployment or specific certifications AgentCenter doesn't offer
- Dashboard as a product — If agent management is your core product, not an internal tool
- Existing platform — If you already have an internal tools platform and adding agent management is incremental
For everyone else, the math strongly favors buying.
The Math: A 3-Year Comparison
| AgentCenter | Build Your Own | |
|---|---|---|
| Year 1 | $948 | $65,000 (build) + $5,000 (infra) |
| Year 2 | $948 | $18,000 (maintenance) + $5,000 (infra) |
| Year 3 | $948 | $18,000 (maintenance) + $5,000 (infra) |
| 3-Year Total | $2,844 | $116,000 |
| Savings with AgentCenter | — | $113,156 |
Even conservative estimates show a 40x cost difference over three years.
Frequently Asked Questions
How long does it really take to build an agent management dashboard?
Plan for 3-6 months for a functional MVP with a team of 1-3 engineers. A production-ready dashboard with approval workflows, analytics, and real-time monitoring typically takes 6-9 months. Most teams underestimate by 50-100%.
Can I customize AgentCenter to match my workflow?
AgentCenter offers configuration-based customization: projects, workspaces, templates, and custom task workflows. It integrates via API, so your agents can send whatever data you need. It won't match unlimited custom code flexibility, but it covers the vast majority of management use cases.
What if we outgrow AgentCenter?
AgentCenter's $79/month flat pricing includes unlimited agents, so growth doesn't increase costs. If you eventually need capabilities AgentCenter doesn't offer, you'll have saved enough money in the interim to fund a custom build with a clear understanding of your actual requirements — which is a much better starting position than building from scratch on day one.
Is $50-80K a realistic estimate for building a dashboard?
Yes, based on typical engineering costs. A senior full-stack engineer costs $150-200K/year. A 4-month project uses ~$50-67K in salary alone, before infrastructure, design, and testing. Many internal tool projects exceed initial estimates by 50-100%.
What about using low-code tools like Retool instead?
Low-code platforms reduce build time but don't eliminate it. You still need engineering time for setup, agent integration, and ongoing maintenance. Retool itself costs $10-50/user/month, and you're still building and maintaining the specific agent management logic. AgentCenter is purpose-built for this exact use case.
Does AgentCenter handle security and compliance?
AgentCenter runs on Hetzner Cloud with encryption. For teams that need specific compliance certifications (SOC 2, HIPAA, etc.), check with AgentCenter directly. For most teams, the security posture exceeds what an internal build would achieve without dedicated security engineering.
The Bottom Line
Building your own AI agent dashboard costs 40x more than AgentCenter over three years, takes months instead of minutes, and diverts engineering resources from your core product. Unless you have unique requirements that no existing tool can meet, the buy decision is clear.
Skip the months of development. Get started with AgentCenter — 10-15 minute setup, $79/month flat, everything included.