# Instructor vs smolagents — Fit & Features

Canonical: https://trutool.co/compare/instructor-vs-smolagents
Author: Snehil (https://trutool.co/authors/snehil)

Compare Instructor and smolagents by use case, features, limitations, and evaluation questions.

## Compare fit, features, and limitations

### Instructor
Extract validated structured data from language model responses.
Best fit: Developers composing agents, structured model outputs, and tool workflows.
- Structured outputs
- Schema validation
- Provider integrations
Before you choose: Check licensing, provider compatibility, maintenance, and tool permissions. Test failure recovery before enabling agent actions.
Pricing: https://python.useinstructor.com
- [Read Instructor profile](https://trutool.co/tools/instructor): Read Instructor profile

### smolagents
Hugging Face library for building tool-using agents with code.
Best fit: Developers building and evaluating custom agents.
- Hugging Face library for building tool-using agents with code
Before you choose: Check licensing, maintenance status, supported providers, and hosting or inference costs.
Pricing: https://huggingface.co/docs/smolagents/index
- [Read smolagents profile](https://trutool.co/tools/smolagents): Read smolagents profile