Hello everybody,
For the last year and so, as a software engineer I have used several generative ai code tools,like cursor,windsurf,claude code,kilo and kiro code.
On this time I’ve built a lot of projects (more than 200) within a variance of topics, from medical software,chatbots,ai agents,3d world games(unity) to even holonomic robots..Bellow I am gonna share my honest review of the tools I ve used the most so far, including the best models for the job.
Cursor AI:
Still the best for me as it offers a variety of models that are fit for any task.
Gemini 2.5 pro was a game changer ,as with its context window it gives you a smooth flow
on the projects, without many back and forths… Also Grok 4 released recently is exceptional on coding tasks,outperforming many time claude,gemini and gpt models.
Lately I used gpt5 on some projects, leaving me with very good impressions on the model.
The thing with cursor though is that you HAVE to give good prompts or else it kinds of “punishes” you with its not so clear pricing plan.. If you are a dev ,I think cursor is perfect for you as long as you provide clear context and not “vibing” a lot…
Windsurf is also a great tool ,which became much much better with its latest updates.
Gpt5 with windsurf is a monster ,and because of its low pricing you can experiment with it a lot.
Also offers a variety of models at very cheap price,some of them really good like GLM 4.5 or Kimi
and some of them free to use, which is a great advantage.
It’s latest updates made it a lot better! Not recommended if you want to use Anthropic models,as they are the only that are overcharged here ,not providing the performance you actually pay.
Claude code cli is also a great tools , but for beginners it might need a longer learning curve.
It give great results in almost every prompt so its great for vibe coders.
For some reason I dont know really know,Anthropic models tend to get worse over time (sonnet 4 started out really great,but lately it seems to get confused even on the clearest tasks).
Kiro Code by Amazon,is the newest tool on my list. It uses only claude 4 sonnet and 3.7 at the moment. I only built one project with it, an extensive advanced portfolio based on Java.
It has the planning feature (tasks→design→requirements) which is a great feature!
It does a really good job on covering every aspect of the project you want ,with a clear path to follow from the beginning to end.
What I didn’t like is the very short sessions and that it over-complicates things sometimes.
Truth is I have to use it some more to get better insights.
Kilo code is also a great tool that comes as an extension on vscode ,offering the largest variety of models I have ever seen.
Also need good prompting (not recommended for vibe coders,as it can get very expensive).
The pricing model is very clear , but without the right prompting it can produce 100 request only with one prompt, so it can get pricy really fast.
For me it is one of the greatest tools out there and I am surprised that it is not so known(bad marketing I guess…)
To sum it up , there are many many tools out there , but from my experience don’t listen to “You can build a production app out of nowhere” . Tools like lovable,bolt etc are great,but one prompt apps always end up with flaws and bugs that you cannot even imagine(from what I personally came accross).
Also when using all the coding tools I mentioned above ,almost any time you have to pick the right mcp servers , as it will make your life much easier (context7,memory,puppeteer etc).
Happy coding!!
!