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Cursor vs Refact.ai

Two fact sheets from our own research, side by side — pricing, platforms, API access and status re-checked by us rather than quoted from the vendors. Cursor starts at $20, Refact.ai at $10. Both have a free tier.

Side by side

FactCursorRefact.ai
CategoryAI Code Editors & IDEsAI Coding Assistants
Pricing modelFreemiumFreemium
Starts at$20 month$10 month
Public APINoNo
PlatformsmacOS, Windows, Linux, WebVscode Ext
CompanyAnysphere, Inc.Small Magellanic Cloud AI Ltd
Launched20232023
Last verifiedSep 6, 2026Sep 6, 2026

What our research says

Cursor

The default choice for developers who want agentic coding inside a real editor, with cloud agents, PR review and multi-model access that large engineering orgs have already standardized on. The catch is the bill: agent-heavy use runs past plan allowances and overages are billed in arrears, so costs need active monitoring.

Pros

  • Agents work with repository-wide context, in-editor and in the cloud
  • Multi-model access includes frontier models plus in-house Composer
  • Free Hobby tier exists for trying agent workflows
  • Widely adopted in large enterprises, so tooling and docs mature fast

Cons

  • Real monthly cost is elastic once usage-based pricing kicks in
  • Pro+ and Ultra pricing is shown only through a plan selector, hurting comparability
  • Proprietary editor lock-in versus plain VS Code with extensions

Refact.ai

One of the few coding agents you can audit and run entirely on your own hardware, at a Pro price well under most rivals. The trade-off is polish: agent and completion quality trail the frontier hosted tools, and the docs subdomain currently redirects somewhere stale.

Pros

  • Open-source core with a real self-hosted path, including fine-tuning
  • Broad IDE coverage beyond the usual VS Code-only support
  • Pro at $10/month undercuts most agent subscriptions
  • Free tier suffices for light daily use

Cons

  • docs.refact.ai currently redirects to an outdated third-party GitHub wiki
  • Output quality depends heavily on which model tier you run
  • Small vendor competing against far larger, faster-moving rivals

Which one fits

Choose Cursor if you need

  • Professional developers running agents on large existing codebases
  • Teams that want code review, cloud agents and editor in one subscription
  • VS Code users wanting a familiar editor with deeper AI integration

Choose Refact.ai if you need

  • Teams whose code must stay on-prem but still want an agent and completions
  • Developers who want AI inside JetBrains, VS Code or Neovim rather than a separate AI editor
  • Tinkerers who prefer open-source AI tooling they can inspect and modify

All Refact.ai alternatives →Browse all AI Code Editors & IDEs