Updated October 2026
AI coding agents read your codebase, edit files, run commands and tests, and work through a task step by step, in your terminal, your editor, or a sandbox. The open source ones are a free alternative to closed tools like Claude Code, Cursor, and GitHub Copilot: you can inspect what they do, self-host them, and bring any model.
Below are the most-starred coding agents on GitHub, from terminal agents and VS Code extensions to agents that take a GitHub issue and open a pull request.
Ranked by GitHub stars and refreshed daily.
by anomalyco
The open source coding agent.
by openai
Lightweight coding agent that runs in your terminal
by google-gemini
An open-source AI agent that brings the power of Gemini directly into your terminal.
by OpenHands
🙌 OpenHands: AI-Driven Development
by cline
Autonomous coding agent as an SDK, IDE extension, or CLI assistant.
by openinterpreter
A coding agent for open models like Kimi K3 and GLM 5.3
by aaif-goose
an open source, extensible AI agent that goes beyond code suggestions - install, execute, edit, and test with any LLM
by Aider-AI
aider is AI pair programming in your terminal
by continuedev
open-source coding agent
by QwenLM
An open-source AI coding agent that lives in your terminal.
by Kilo-Org
Kilo is the all-in-one agentic engineering platform. Build, ship, and iterate faster with the most popular open source coding agent.
by coleam00
The first open-source harness builder for AI coding. Make AI coding deterministic and repeatable.
by SWE-agent
SWE-agent takes a GitHub issue and tries to automatically fix it, using your LM of choice. It can also be employed for offensive cybersecurity or competitive coding challenges. [NeurIPS 2024]
by The-PR-Agent
🚀 PR Agent: The Original Open-Source PR Reviewer. This project is not the Qodo free tier.
by tailcallhq
AI enabled pair programmer for Claude, GPT, O Series, Grok, Deepseek, Gemini and 300+ models
by vastsa
Local-first AI coding agent desktop: Electron + Rust host core + pi Agent Harness + user-installable plugins
It depends on where you work. By GitHub stars, the most popular right now are OpenCode, Codex CLI, and Gemini CLI. Terminal agents suit command-line workflows, while extensions such as Cline and Continue live inside your editor.
Yes. OpenCode, Aider, Codex CLI, Gemini CLI, and Goose all run in the terminal like Claude Code does, and most of them work with several model providers, including local models.
The software is free to use under its open source license. You still pay for the model you connect, unless you run an open-weight model locally.
