Langflow earned its stars honestly: a genuinely pleasant drag-and-drop builder, components you can drop down to Python on, a playground for testing, and every flow deployable as an API endpoint or MCP server. If you want to prototype an LLM pipeline visually, it's a good tool.
The canvas is a build surface, though. Runs execute the flow as built — the Playground is for sending inputs and watching outputs, not for reaching in and moving the wiring while a run is in flight. LiveGraph starts from the assumption that the run itself is when you most need the edit.
| Dimension | Langflow | LiveGraph |
|---|---|---|
| The canvas's job | Where you build and test the flow — components, wires, and a Playground for trying inputs. | The product itself — a visible, editable graph of agents, routers, and approval gates, before and during the run. |
| Canvas during a run | A test and inspection surface — watch outputs and tool calls, but not a steering wheel. | Stays live — every hop is visible while it executes, and dragging an edge changes where this run goes next. |
| Mid-run rerouting | No documented way to redirect a run mid-flight — inferred from absent features, not a verified limitation. | Drag an edge; the next hop follows the new route. |
| Custom logic | Every component's Python source is editable in-app — real code under the drag-and-drop. | MCP servers, scoped http_request endpoints, and file tools — narrower than arbitrary Python, by design. |
| Deploy a flow as | An API endpoint or MCP server per flow; exportable as JSON. | API keys per graph, schedules, webhooks — plus an embeddable live run view. |
| Model roster | All the major LLM providers, per component. | Per-node provider and model — Anthropic, OpenAI, Google, Groq, OpenRouter, or an OpenAI-compatible endpoint; your call per node. |
| Observability | Via integrations — LangSmith, Langfuse, and others. | Every hop lands as an ordered run event — input, output, the routing explanation, and its cost — and approval decisions are stamped with who and when. |
| Hosting & pricing | Free and open source; you run it — the managed cloud shut down in April 2026. | Hosted web app at livegraph.ai. Flat team price — runs are never metered. Model usage on hosted keys is metered on top; your own keys are never marked up. |
Competitor rows are limited to claims verified in our own research — "Not evaluated" means we didn't check, not that the capability is missing. On the LiveGraph side, one nuance: runs started from chat or the canvas Run button are steerable; unattended runs (API, schedules, webhooks) run pinned to the graph they started on — steering is a watched-run feature, by design.
Langflow and LiveGraph agree the graph should be visible — they disagree about when it should be alive. A flow you can only edit between runs is a blueprint; a canvas you can edit during one is a control surface. If your runs are watched and occasionally wrong, that difference is the product.
The live demo runs a real multi-agent graph in your browser — no signup, no API key — including the mid-run edge drag. If the canvas earns it, an account takes a minute.