Amp vs Cursor
A detailed comparison to help you choose between Amp and Cursor.
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Verdict: Cursor wins
Cursor scores 4.2/5, edging out Amp at 3.8/5. Professional developers who want the strongest codebase-aware agent editor and can use (or tolerate paying for) the Grok/X bundle around it.
Amp AI coding agent by Anthropic alumni | Cursor The AI-first code editor | |
|---|---|---|
| Rating | 3.8 (1 review) | 4.2 (1 review) |
| Pricing Model | freemium | freemium |
| Starting Price | Free tier available | Free tier available |
| Best For | Senior, terminal-comfortable developers who want unattended agents on remote machines and are happy to fund them with linked subscriptions and their own keys. | Professional developers who want the strongest codebase-aware agent editor and can use (or tolerate paying for) the Grok/X bundle around it. |
| Free Tier | ||
| API Access | ||
| Team Features | ||
| Open Source | ||
| Tags | free tierbyok | free tierbyok |
| Visit Amp → | Visit Cursor → |
Amp
Pros
- + Orb workflow is real: I dispatched an environment-setup and test-green task to a remote orb, closed the laptop, and resumed from another machine with the work done
- + No Amp token fees or limits — BYOK and linked ChatGPT/Claude/X subscriptions run at subscription cost, and self-hosted orbs and own runners are free on every tier
- + Teams workspaces add SSO (SAML/OIDC), shared billing, pooled credits and shared BYOK routing at no extra seat charge
- + Transparent per-action economics: credits at provider API prices with no markup for individuals, published tier allowances (45,000 minutes on Megawatt), and clearly stated orb sizes
- + Genuinely unattended parallelism — agents in separate orbs with their own repo clones and tooling, so no worktree juggling or port conflicts in my runs
Cons
- - Orb minutes burn while agents idle: a slow install consumed my allowance at the same per-minute rate as active work, and I found no per-workload spend cap
- - Hobby has no included orb time or agent usage — 'free' means your tokens and your own machines
- - Custom endpoint URLs and gateway routing (OpenRouter, Bedrock, Azure Foundry) are early access for paid tiers behind an experimental flag, with no public rollout date
- - Homegrown vocabulary (orbs, portals, the Dial) and a terminal-first surface make onboarding deliberately steep for GUI-oriented developers
- - Amp's published 60–65% average usage discount is a vendor claim without a stated basis; included usage does not roll over month to month
Cursor
Pros
- + Codebase context is the deepest I have tested — multi-file refactors arrive as coherent changes across routes, tests and types
- + The X Subscription bundles Grok, Cursor and X Premium: Premium at $30/mo replaces what xAI says was $90/mo of separate plans (x.ai/news/x-subscription)
- + Agent surface is broad: Cloud Agents, Automations, Bugbot PR review, CLI, Cursor SDK and an iOS app behind one router
- + Legacy subscribers keep their old plans and prices — the migration is optional, with prorated refunds on switching (cursor.com/help)
- + Familiar VS Code base means your extensions, keybindings and workflows come along
Cons
- - Acquired and re-platformed: new plans bill through grok.com with a Grok-weighted model lineup, and switching from a legacy plan is permanent
- - Plus at $8/mo is a teaser — no Auto, Cloud Agents, Automations or Bugbot; professional work needs Premium at $30/mo or above
- - Proprietary code goes to Cursor's servers during indexing and agent runs unless you configure privacy controls
- - Third-party models bill at API list price from prepaid credit, so costs outside the included pool are hard to predict
- - Two coexisting billing systems and two plan ladders make the real cost of a given workload hard to compare
Frequently Asked Questions
Which is better, Amp or Cursor?▼
Cursor scores higher at 4.2/5 vs 3.8/5 for Amp, making it the better-rated option in our comparison.
What is the difference between Amp and Cursor?▼
Amp: Amp is a coding agent and development environment from Sourcegraph that runs unattended tasks in the cloud or locally through a CLI. Cursor: Cursor is an AI code editor built on VS Code, with agents that can read a whole codebase, answer questions about it and make changes across multiple files.
Is Amp or Cursor more affordable?▼
Amp starts at €0/mo, Cursor starts at €0/mo. Check the comparison table above for current pricing.
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