- Cursor — the AI-native code editor
Cursor is a fork of VS Code rebuilt around an in-editor AI agent. The editor is the chat window. After a year of daily use, here's the honest read.
- Claude — Anthropic's frontier model
Claude is Anthropic's flagship model family. Strong on reasoning, writing, and agentic tool use. Available via Claude.ai, the API, and as Claude Code in the terminal.
- GitHub Copilot — the original AI pair programmer
Copilot is the AI completion layer that lives inside your existing editor. Five years in, it's polished, pricing is fair, and for most teams it's the path of least resistance.
- Windsurf — Codeium's AI-native editor
Windsurf is Codeium's answer to Cursor: a VS Code fork built around an in-editor agent. Strong at codebase-wide reasoning, sharper free tier, smaller community.