Continue vs Devin Desktop
Pricing
Continue: Free (open source), no longer maintained since June 2026
Devin Desktop: Free tier, Pro $20/mo, Max $200/mo
Description
Continue: Open-source AI assistant for VS Code and JetBrains. Cursor acquired it in June 2026 and the project is now read-only
Devin Desktop: AI IDE (formerly Windsurf) with an agent mode (Cascade) and a command center for running local and cloud coding agents across your project
Pros
- The final 2.0 release still installs for free from the VS Code Marketplace, Open VSX and npm
- Works with your own API keys (Anthropic, OpenAI, Gemini and others) or local models through Ollama and LM Studio
- The code stays available under the Apache 2.0 license, so anyone can fork it
- Cascade agent mode handles multi-file changes without hand-holding
- Agent Command Center lets you start, track and review several local and cloud agents from one board
- Free tier with unlimited Tab completions and inline edits, enough to evaluate before paying
Cons
- No longer maintained: no bug fixes, security patches or support for new models
- Hosted accounts and sign-in were retired after the acquisition
- Requires setup: picking a model, getting API keys, configuring the tool
- Had a messy 2025: acquisition talks with OpenAI fell through, and talent split between Google and Cognition
- Smaller community means fewer tutorials and troubleshooting resources
- Context window can hit limits on larger projects
Details
Continue was the “bring your own model” approach to AI coding: a free, open-source extension for VS Code and JetBrains, plus a CLI, that connected to the LLM of your choice, from cloud APIs like Claude to local models through Ollama. You got autocomplete, chat and inline editing without a subscription.
In June 2026 Cursor acquired Continue. The team shipped a final 2.0 release on 19 June 2026, retired hosted accounts and sign-in, and made the GitHub repository read-only. The extensions still install and run with your own keys, but nothing will be fixed or updated. For the same free, model-agnostic setup with active development, use Cline inside VS Code, or Aider or Claude Code in the terminal.
Devin Desktop is the new name for Windsurf, the AI IDE that started as Codeium’s editor. It is now made by Cognition, the company behind the Devin coding agent. It still combines regular code completion with Cascade, an agent mode that can plan out multi-step tasks and execute them across your project. Tell it “add user authentication to this app” and it will create files, install packages, and wire things up.
The rename put an Agent Command Center at the front: a board where you run and review local and cloud agents, including Cascade, Codex and Claude Agent, while the full IDE stays available. Pro costs $20/mo and adds higher usage quotas, frontier models and Devin Cloud agents. The company had a turbulent 2025, when a $3B acquisition by OpenAI fell apart and talent ended up split between Google and Cognition, but the product now has a clear owner. If you want a capable AI IDE that can also manage several coding agents at once, it is worth trying.
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