Which AI coding tool should I use?
Short answer
For agentic work in an existing codebase, terminal-based tools like Claude Code and OpenAI's Codex are the current default. For editing with AI assistance in a familiar interface, Cursor and GitHub Copilot suit people who already write code. Gemini is strong on very large contexts. The honest answer is that the differences between the frontier tools matter far less than how precisely you can describe what you want.
The longer version
For agentic work inside an existing codebase — where you want the tool to read the project, make changes across several files and run things — the terminal-based tools like Claude Code and Codex are the current default. For editing with assistance in an interface you already know, Cursor and Copilot suit people who write code themselves and want it to go faster.
The honest answer is that the differences between the frontier tools matter much less than how precisely you can describe what you want. People switching tools looking for better output are usually solving the wrong problem: a vague instruction produces mediocre results everywhere, and a well-specified one produces good results almost everywhere.
If you are choosing for the first time, pick the one that fits how you already work rather than the one that benchmarks best this month, and spend the effort you would have spent comparing them on learning to brief it properly instead.
The full argument, with the rest of the picture around it:
Vibe Coding Killed the Idea Backlog. Now Everyone Has the Same Problem