EU Sovereignty Score
Non-EU vendorAI CoworkHeadquarters: SG

Manus: sovereignty score and 8 European alternatives

Manus is a general-purpose AI agent platform that carries out complete tasks on its own: from a plain-language instruction it produces slides, websites, games, videos and designs. It is delivered as a cloud service through the web, with an API. According to its privacy policy, the provider is Butterfly Effect Pte. Ltd., based in Singapore; the website lists Manus AI as copyright holder.

The vendor does not publish the regions in which customer data is stored and names no EU hosting option. There is no open-source version and no self-hosting option. For a European organisation this means it has to ask where data is processed, which jurisdiction applies and which data processing agreement is offered before it deploys Manus. The operating entity is based in Singapore, outside the EU. Because Manus cannot be self-hosted, the vendor decides where and under which terms your data is processed.

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Sovereignty score
32 / 1000 = high exposure
100 = sovereign
  • Jurisdiction SOV-250
    Headquartered outside the EU (SG)
  • Data residency SOV-30
    No hosting in Europe (OTHER)
  • Cryptographic key sovereignty SOV-340
    Key management with a non-European vendor
  • Freedom from lock-in SOV-640
    Closed source: switching requires data migration
  • Source & runtime sovereignty SOV-4 · SOV-630
    Closed source, runtime with the vendor

SOV codes: the matching objective in the European Commission's Cloud Sovereignty Framework. Official source

How the score is calculated

Facts and evidence

Last checked October 10, 2026
Headquarters
SG (OTHER)Verified by hand
EU adequacy decision
No — no adequacy decisionVerified by hand
Sovereignty model
Vendor-hosted (non-EU)Verified by hand
Data hosting
OTHERVerified by hand
Open-source
NoVerified by hand
GDPR-compliant
NoVendor-stated
Category
AI Cowork
Type
Product
Website
manus.im ↗

How we verify · Something wrong? Suggest a correction

Top EU-based & GDPR-compliant alternatives to Manus

The European alternatives to Manus come from our knowledge base of over 6,800 vendors. We only list vendors headquartered in the EU or the EEA; fully European-owned vendors rank before vendors with a foreign owner. For each alternative you see the country, the open-source status and a short description.

Score per alternative: 0 = high exposure, 100 = sovereign

20 European AI Cowork vendors are in the catalogue. View the whole category · Submit an alternative · View category on the map

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Why digital sovereignty matters with Manus

Manus is headquartered in SG, outside the EU. Contracts and data therefore also fall under non-European law. The GDPR applies through contractual terms, but in a conflict with local legislation you have less certainty than with a European vendor.

Manus hosts data outside the EU (OTHER). Personal data therefore leaves the EU, which requires a transfer mechanism under the GDPR and pulls the data residency score down.

Manus is closed source and hosted by the vendor. The encryption keys and the runtime sit with the vendor and switching requires data migration. Ask about bring-your-own-key, export options and open standards.

What this means for your organisation depends on your whole stack and context. The free assessment weighs Manus together with your other vendors and gives a total score, a heatmap and the main risk drivers.

Frequently asked questions

What is the best European alternative to Manus?

It depends on your use case. Strong EU alternatives to Manus include Dust, Langdock and Nextcloud Assistant. On this page you can compare 8 EU alternatives by jurisdiction, data residency and open-source status.

Are there open-source alternatives to Manus?

Yes. Open-source EU alternatives to Manus include Dust and Nextcloud Assistant. These keep your data fully under your own control and let you self-host if you want to.

Is Manus GDPR-compliant and where is the data hosted?

Manus is headquartered in SG (OTHER) and hosts data in OTHER. Its GDPR compliance is limited or unclear. For full EU data residency the EU alternatives on this page usually offer more certainty.

Details and sources

Verified by handHeadquarters, owner, hosting locations and licence have been checked by us against public sources. Free of charge and for every vendor, not a paid label. Nothing in this knowledge base is taken over automatically. Last checked on October 10, 2026.

Sources

Public sources used in the latest check of this record.

Compliance evidence

The links below point to the vendor's own public documents. We only record what we found: a missing link means "not found publicly", not "not compliant".

No public compliance evidence has been recorded for this vendor yet. Do you know its DPA or subprocessor list? Something wrong? Suggest a correction

Digital sovereignty in AI Cowork

AI Cowork: Autonomous AI desktop agents — multi-step task execution, document processing, workflow automation. In this category the choice of vendor determines who has legal access to your data, where that data lives and how easily you can switch later.

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8 European alternatives to Manus — GDPR-compliant & EU-hosted · EU Sovereignty Score