An honest comparison from one PM shipping one pilot per week.
Pick your use case, get a recommendation, see the tradeoffs.
What are you building?
Pick a use case to get my recommendation and the runners-up.
The full comparison
6 evaluated, 5 to evaluate.
Usage-based via Anthropic API My daily driver for production builds — terminal-native agent that edits real repos.
Strengths
- Deep multi-file reasoning — edits real repos in place
- Sub-agents and tool use are first-class
- Pairs naturally with git workflows
Weaknesses
- Terminal-native learning curve
- Slower visual iteration than UI builders
- Best when you are comfortable reading diffs
Last used May 30, 20261 - 3 hrs
Claude Cowork
Desktop Agent
Subscription (Claude Pro/Max) File-aware desktop workflows — like a coworker pairing on your local folders.
Strengths
- Native filesystem access with zero setup
- Great for workflows over local documents and folders
- Calls MCPs directly from the desktop app
Weaknesses
- Not optimized for large codebases
- Output lives on your machine, not a hosted repo
- Less control than a CLI agent
Last used May 24, 20261 - 2 hrs
Pair-coding IDE that shines on larger refactors and codebase Q&A.
Strengths
- Excellent inline edit and tab completion
- Codebase-wide Q&A inside a familiar VSCode shell
- Strong on refactors and existing-code work
Weaknesses
- Can over-edit on vague prompts
- Agent mode less mature than Claude Code
- Subscription cost adds up at scale
Last used May 27, 20261 - 3 hrs
Google Antigravity
AI-Native IDE
Free preview / Google AI pricing Gemini-powered IDE — a credible alternative to Cursor with long-context strengths.
Strengths
- Massive Gemini context window for large repos
- Strong at planning and architectural reasoning
- Generous free tier
Weaknesses
- Newer ecosystem with fewer extensions
- Gemini-only — no Claude or GPT routing
- Smaller community for troubleshooting
Last used May 20, 20261 - 3 hrs
Lovable
No-Code App Builder
Fastest path from idea to live URL — prompt in, deployed app out.
Strengths
- Prompt to deployed URL in under an hour
- Live preview with instant deploy
- Supabase integration is one click
Weaknesses
- Less control for deep custom logic
- Harder to drop into raw code when needed
- Opinionated UI defaults
Last used May 31, 202630 min - 2 hrs
Free self-hosted; paid cloud tiers Visual workflow builder with growing AI node support — Zapier's developer-friendly cousin.
Strengths
- Inspectable visual flows make debugging integrations easy
- Large library of native SaaS connectors
- Self-hostable when data residency matters
Weaknesses
- Less code-level control than a CLI agent
- AI nodes still maturing relative to dedicated agent frameworks
- Complex branching flows can become hard to read
Last used May 29, 20261 - 3 hrs
Touched — deeper evaluation pending
Played with, not yet shipped a real pilot.
v0 by Vercel
Web App Generator
Planning to test how it handles a full marketing site vs. just components.
Replit Agent
No-Code App Builder
Planning to test end-to-end build + deploy for an internal tool pilot.
GitHub Spark
Web App Generator
Planning to test the micro-app workflow and how it integrates with GitHub.
Open-source agentic build tool — exploring how it compares to closed-source CLI agents.
Played with the tool; planning a real pilot to test multi-file editing and agent orchestration.
Autonomous agent that plans and executes multi-step tasks end-to-end.
Played with task planning and execution; planning a real pilot to test reliability on a structured workflow.