Promptmonitor — How often does AI recommend your brand to customers? Aider vs Antigravity vs Cursor vs Windsurf: Complete Comparison (2026)
Aider is the best fit if you want terminal-first, Git-auditable AI edits with minimal product lock-in, but you will pay your LLM provider directly. Cursor and Windsurf are the most mature “VS Code fork” editors for day-to-day AI coding, with Cursor leaning premium and Windsurf leaning value plus previews and deploys. Antigravity stands out for parallel multi-agent orchestration and artifact-based verification, but it is still preview-stage and its long-term pricing is not fully proven.
Comparison Overview
| Criteria |  Cursor |  Windsurf |  Antigravity |  Aider |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Aider vs Cursor vs Windsurf Pricing Measures how predictable and cost-effective each product is, including subscription price, usage limits, and whether LLM costs are bundled or external. | 6Clear tiers, but pricing gets expensive for power users and teams. | 8 |
AI coding tools in 2026 split into two camps: terminal-based pair programming you control end-to-end, and full desktop editors that try to turn “make this change” into a repeatable workflow with agents, diffs, and context. Aider, Antigravity, Cursor, and Windsurf sit at key points on that spectrum, which is why they often come up in the same short list when teams evaluate a modern AI coding stack.
Aider is the outlier: it is open-source and runs in your terminal, focusing on repository-aware edits and Git-native reviewability (diffs, atomic commits, undo). It appeals to developers who want an auditable workflow and are comfortable managing model selection and token spend themselves.
By contrast, Cursor, Windsurf, and Antigravity are VS Code-style desktop IDEs designed to keep AI assistance inside the editor, with features like multi-file refactors, agent modes, and extension compatibility. Cursor is often evaluated as the “default” premium option for strong completions and repo-aware editing. Windsurf competes aggressively on price and adds productized previews and deployments for shipping full-stack changes. Antigravity (Google-backed) differentiates with parallel agent orchestration across editor, terminal, and browser, plus artifacts like plans and recordings meant to make autonomous changes easier to verify.
Detailed Analysis
Aider vs Cursor vs Windsurf Pricing
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Aider
8Aider is free and open-source, so there is no subscription fee, but real cost depends on the model provider you connect (OpenAI, Anthropic, DeepSeek, local models). This can be very cost-effective for light usage or BYO infrastructure, but less predictable for heavy usage on premium models. There is also a “time cost” for setup and workflow tuning that subscription tools partially absorb.
Verdict
Choose Aider if your priority is Git-auditable, terminal-first AI pair programming and you do not want to commit to a proprietary IDE. It is especially strong for disciplined repo work (atomic commits, diffs, undo), but it demands comfort with the command line and you will still incur LLM API costs.
Pick Cursor if you want the most mature, polished AI VS Code fork with strong completions and reliable multi-file refactors (Composer), and you can justify its higher tiers for heavier usage or teams.
Pick Windsurf if you want good capability per dollar and value built-in previews and deploys for full-stack iteration, while accepting credit-based limits that can bite power users.
Consider Antigravity if you specifically need parallel, multi-agent delegation with artifact-driven verification across editor, terminal, and browser. Its preview status and expected future pricing make it the option most worth piloting before standardizing.
Frequently Asked Questions
Is Aider a replacement for Cursor or Windsurf?
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Which is better for multi-agent, parallel task delegation, Antigravity or Cursor?
Some details in this comparison could not be fully verified. Please double-check the following before making decisions:
- Exact post-preview pricing, plan structure, and usage limits for Antigravity could not be independently verified and may change as it exits public preview
- The reported SWE-bench and Terminal-Bench percentages could not be re-verified against a single canonical benchmark page, and results can vary by harness, model version, and evaluation date
- Cursor’s and Windsurf’s exact context-window limits can vary by model and tier, and the practical usable context in real repos could not be verified beyond publicly stated ranges
- Antigravity’s enterprise support terms (SLAs, security attestations, and admin controls) could not be verified from stable public documentation during preview
- Aider’s performance cannot be cleanly benchmarked as a product because outcomes depend heavily on the chosen LLM provider, model settings, and token budgets