Cursor or Claude Code?
I love @Cursor. It's enabled me to build (vibe code) so many web apps, sites, extensions, and little things quickly that 1. bring me joy and 2. help me with work or realize personal projects.
However... I'm seeing a TON of movement around @Claude by Anthropic's Claude Code. I haven't personally tried it but it's apparently insane (and can also be expensive?)
I'm curious. Should I switch? What are you currently using? Or do they both have their own use case. I right now like cursor because I can build directly in a GitHub repo or locally and it helps me learn my way around an IDE.
Looking forward to hearing everyone's thoughts!
Replies
I have been using Cursor and I like the flexibility to switch between coding by myself and asking AI to do it, which Claude Code CLI might not offer
Depends on your coding style I guess. What style do you prefer?
I found a free stack that is currently working pretty well:
Visual Studio Code
@Cline (100% free).
@Google AI (free tier).
Product Hunt
@leandro_sardi got my attention with free stack. I haven't used Cline yet, how do you like it?
@gabe It is not as good as Claude, but it works good if you are skilled to review its work and tweak prompts.
Not good for non-skilled vibe coders.
I saw somewhere that Google launched a brand new Geminy CLI (similar to Claude's), with a generous free tier.
Optibot
I recently stopped paying for cursor and moved fully to Claude Code. It is a step up in pricing but the output is usually more accurate and requires fewer iterations vs what I'd have to do in Cursor with the same prompt. I also have some really interesting data from our own user base on Cursor code quality with Claude vs Claude Code.
Claude Code on average produces less overall code reworks by close to 30% and gets things right in the first or second iteration. Whereas Cursor with Claude 3.5 and 3.7 still tends to produce higher code churn.
We've also seen a lot of our own customers move to Claude Code and Codex fully while sticking to using VSCode.
Claude code also tends to produce code which follows existing patterns and has higher modularity by default. We know this because on our reviewer gives less recommendations on modularity and code abstractions for customers of ours that use Claude Code and Codex.
I still use cursor as my go to code editor for making non-complex side-projects but for internal use we our engineers are still very much divided, half on Cursor and half of us on Claude code.
My current stack is:
IDE:
@VS Code with Claude Code
MCP:
@GitHub and Context7
Reviewer and Codebase maintenance:
@Optibot
Optibot
oh and theres a VS code extension for Claude Code too https://marketplace.visualstudio.com/items?itemName=anthropic.claude-code
Product Hunt
@syedahmedz Woah this is all super interesting data, now I kinda want a full report of what you're seeing. It's so curious that while they have access to the same models output is that different. What's really eye opening imo is that Claude Code uses existing patterns, I feel like this is huge for existing teams working on large codebases.
Nah bro. Cline + gemini cli hock. 2x Free. Best models. No context cap. 60 calls per min. Brrrrrr. Breakdown: https://www.producthunt.com/products/google?comment=4693656
Product Hunt
@sentry_co yo wait, what. I need to experiment with this
@gabe The gemini cli github account is getting pounded RN https://github.com/google-gemini/gemini-cli/issues . Classic "SEFO" 😬 "ship early and find out" As an alternative if the gemini connection is flaky because of high traffic / early bugs etc. Then there is also Cline with Grok 3. Its pretty good actually. Also free for now (requires a very painless 1-click singup with GitHub on Clines website). Sponsored by the rocket man him self ✨🚀
I prefer having a user interface over using the terminal, because it allows me to better understand what the AI has changed and gives me a greater sense of control.
Product Hunt
@hi_caicai I feel this, I keep trying to dev in a terminal and I'm like "what just happened" lol
@hi_caicai I think you’re right, and there are some workarounds. Claude Code now opens a temporary tab in VS Code with a clean diff in the UI, which helps. One drawback is that it collapses terminal output, so you have to keep toggling it open and back. Eventually it would be nice if it wrote that output to temporary files in the repo root or something.
Gabe, totally with you Cursor has changed the way I approach small builds and quick experiments. Being able to work directly in a GitHub repo without breaking flow is a huge win. It’s less about flashy features and more about frictionless momentum.
Haven’t personally used Claude yet, so can’t compare, but if Cursor is helping you learn and ship, that’s already a big win in itself. Would love to hear how it stacks up if you end up testing both!
Product Hunt
@priyanka_gosai1 Yes, all of this! I'm a bit hesitant to try out Claude Code simply because it's mostly in terminal but.... I might have to bite the bullet.
Product Hunt
Claude Code is remarkably better at returning good code. It's so much better that I find myself wondering how Cursor and Windsurf are not able to be as good given the underlying model is the same (maybe?).
The downsides to Claude code are:
It costs way more and you have very little control over how long it takes to do things and how much it thinks
I don't like doing everything via command line. Having the diff view in the IDE with Cursor/Windsurf is much nicer for me. Claude Code has plugins for the JetBrains IDEs but they are still clunky compared to the VS code options.
Some things that make Claude Code amazing are:
Integration with GitHub, ex tag it on issues, pull requests etc and it will work async
MCP support for all kinds of goodies. Some fun ones are Sentry and Linear, ex go fix this bug or go build this feature
Product Hunt
@steveb YES! I'm wondering the same thing, like how is everyone saying that its that much better if Cursor technically has access to the same models.
I agree with you, I like working in the IDE environment over a command line...but with the way @Warp is going...that might change soon.
The cost and loss of control is what scares me, with Cursor while I may be debugging more, I feel like I can easily see and manage what's happening.
Product Hunt
@sharvin_zlife is it like night and day?
Cursor is made for coding but Claude isn't
Cursor has allowed me to be able to build with speed on small projects. Claude Code is too expensive, especially if you are not in mastery of what you want. If you have a set plan, it may be worth it.
Claude code has been available in the default Claude plan for a while now. Limited tokens per day but enough to get shit done. It integrates quite well with both vscode and cursor so I actually use both. When you run the Claude command in a cursor terminal you can easily set it up with the dedicated Claude code command which will add a little Claude button to your editor. Tapping it will give you an extra Claude window. I tend to use that until I run out of tokens and then I switch to cursor to continue. That way I never have to do the pay as you go and I can save myself from vibe coding myself to bankruptcy 😅
Context: I've been a software engineer for a fairly long time, and I have a workflow that's hard-won and works well for me. I use the terminal heavily. I write code in vim.
So, I'm a big fan of Claude Code because it's a CLI that sits in a terminal window and doesn't demand I change my existing workflow. I like this approach.
Claude Code produces good results for me, and I love some of the recent updates, like being able to use sub agents. Anthropic are doing awesome work with Claude Code.
But as others say, it depends what workflow works for you.