MCP (Model Context Protocol)

Cursor is a VS Code–based AI-native editor with repo-aware chat, multi-file edits, Composer/agent modes, and cloud background agents.

Windsurf is Cognition's AI IDE (ex-Codeium) built around Cascade multi-step agent flows, sold on the same Free / Pro / Max / Teams sheet as Devin.

Claude Code is Anthropic's terminal-native coding agent: it plans, edits, runs commands, uses Git and MCP, and sustains long agentic loops.

Codex is OpenAI's coding agent: an open-source terminal CLI, a desktop app, IDE extensions, and a cloud lane for async tasks, all included in ChatGPT plans.

Aider is an open-source, Git-native pair programmer: it maps the repo, proposes commits, and works with any model via BYOK or OpenRouter.

Cline is an open-source VS Code agent that plans, edits, and runs tools with BYOK models and approval controls.

Amp is a terminal-first, multi-model coding agent with subagents, an Oracle second-opinion model, threads, and MCP plugins.

OpenCode is an MIT-licensed open-source terminal coding agent that is fully BYOK, with optional hosted model access via Zen and Go.

Goose is Block's local-first agent runtime with many model providers and extensible tool plugins.

OpenScout / Scout is a local-first broker that lets addressable agents (Claude Code, Codex, Cursor) send and ask across harnesses on one mesh.

Model Context Protocol is an open protocol for connecting agents and IDEs to tools and data sources through MCP servers.

Kiro is AWS's agent-first IDE: spec-driven development (requirements → design → tasks), agent hooks, and an Auto agent, with a CLI.

Google Antigravity is Google's agent-first IDE and CLI, the successor surface to Gemini Code Assist for individuals and Gemini CLI.

Gemini CLI is Google's open-source terminal agent; on June 18, 2026 it stopped serving free and Google AI Pro/Ultra accounts in favor of the Antigravity CLI.

Zed is a fast native editor (Rust, GPU-rendered) with a built-in agent panel, edit predictions, and hosted or BYOK models.

Warp is a terminal that ships its own coding agent (Warp Agent / Oz) with plan-bundled credits, so the shell itself runs agentic tasks.

Augment Code is a context-engine coding agent for large codebases, available in VS Code, JetBrains, and a CLI (Auggie), priced as one flat team plan.

Kimi Code is Moonshot AI's single-binary terminal agent — tuned TUI, subagents, conversational MCP setup, lifecycle hooks, and ACP for Zed/JetBrains. Runs Kimi models by default but also speaks Anthropic, OpenAI, and Gemini protocols.

Qwen Code is Alibaba's open-source terminal agent — adapted from Gemini CLI and tuned for Qwen3-Coder — with subagents, agent teams, auto-memory and auto-skills, IDE plugins, a desktop app, daemon mode, and SDKs.

Mistral Vibe is Mistral's open-source CLI coding agent powered by Devstral 2 — terminal-native multi-file automation with IDE extensions for VS Code, JetBrains, and Zed over ACP. Its enterprise counterpart is Mistral Code.

Crush is Charm's open-source terminal coding agent — multi-model sessions that can switch providers mid-session, LSP-enhanced context, MCP support, and a polished TUI on every major platform.

Kilo Code is an open-source agentic platform — VS Code/JetBrains extension, CLI, Slack, and cloud agents over a shared OpenCode engine. Started as a Roo Code fork and became the main migration path after Roo's May 2026 shutdown.

Instinct is a self-learning memory MCP server for coding agents — it observes repeated patterns, scores them by confidence, and promotes mature ones into suggestions it exports back to Claude Code, Cursor, Windsurf, Codex, and CLAUDE.md.

nanobot is HKUDS's Python answer to OpenClaw — a compact, MCP-native assistant codebase you can audit in an afternoon, popular as a learning platform and a base for custom assistants.

BeeAI is IBM's open-source agent platform — run, compose, and observe agents locally or on a cluster, with ACP/A2A-style interop and a web UI for non-technical operators.

CrewAI is the most widely adopted multi-agent framework: model crews of role-based agents in YAML or Python, run sequential or hierarchical processes, and manage fleets through the CrewAI control plane.

Microsoft Agent Framework is the successor to AutoGen and Semantic Kernel's agent pieces — one OSS framework (Python and .NET) for single agents, multi-agent graphs, and Magentic-style orchestration.

LangGraph is LangChain's agent orchestration framework — durable stateful graphs with supervisor and swarm multi-agent patterns, checkpointing, and LangGraph Platform for deployment.