Aider vs Zed
Aider uniquely has 8 features · Zed uniquely has 8 features.
| Aider | Zed | |
|---|---|---|
| Company | ||
| Founded | 2023 | 2021 |
| HQ | — | San Francisco, USA |
| AI model | Claude 3.7 Sonnet, DeepSeek R1, OpenAI o1/o3-mini/GPT-4o, and others | Claude (Anthropic), GPT (OpenAI), Gemini (Google), DeepSeek, and others via bring-your-own-key |
| Platforms | CLI (Linux, macOS, Windows) | macOS |
| Languages | 100+ programming languages including Python, JavaScript, Rust, Ruby, Go, C++, PHP, HTML, CSS | Most major programming languages via LSP and extensions |
| Pricing | ||
| Pricing model | Usage-based | Freemium |
| Free plan | Yes | Yes |
| Free trial | No | Yes |
| Starting price | Free — Open Source | $0/mo |
| Enterprise | — | Custom — order forms available at 25+ seats (contact sales@zed.dev) |
| Refund policy | Not applicable — free and open source | — |
| All plans | Open Source / FreeFree usage | PersonalFreePro$10/moBusiness$30/seat/mo |
| Positioning | ||
| Best for | Developers who want AI pair programming in their local terminal via open-source tooling | Developers seeking a fast, AI-powered collaborative code editor |
| Differentiator | Fully free and open-source; users pay only for their chosen AI API (OpenAI, Anthropic, OpenRouter, etc.) with no platform subscription fee | Next-generation code editor with built-in AI edit predictions and real-time collaboration |
| Competitors | GitHub Copilot, Cursor, Continue | VS Code, Cursor, Neovim, JetBrains IDEs, Windsurf |
| Features | ||
| Bring Your Own API Key | ✓ | — |
| Data Governance Controls | — | ✓ |
| External Agent Support (Claude, Codex Cli) | — | ✓ |
| Multi Model Support | ✓ | — |
| Open Source | ✓ | — |
| Org Wide AI Model Policies | — | ✓ |
| Role Based Access Controls | — | ✓ |
| Terminal/Cli Based | ✓ | — |
| Unlimited Edit Predictions (Pro+) | — | ✓ |
| Usage Based Billing | — | ✓ |
| Cli Support | ✓ | ✓ |
| Code Completion | ✕ | ✓ |
| Code Generation | ✓ | ✓ |
| Code Review | ✓ | ✓ |
| Codebase Indexing | ✓ | ✓ |
| Debugging | ✓ | ✓ |
| Git Integration | ✓ | ✓ |
| IDE Plugins | ✓ | ✕ |
| Multi Language Support | ✓ | ✓ |
| Refactoring | ✓ | ✓ |
| Security Scanning | ✕ | — |
| Self Hosted Option | ✓ | ✕ |
| Team Features | ✕ | ✓ |
| Test Generation | ✓ | ✓ |
| Integrations | ||
| API Access | ✓ | ✓ |
| Github Integration | ✓ | ✓ |
| Gitlab Integration | ✓ | — |
| Jetbrains Plugin | — | ✕ |
| Key Integrations | OpenAI API, Anthropic API, DeepSeek API, local LLMs, git, IDE/editor comment workflow, voice input | Anthropic Claude, OpenAI GPT, Google Gemini, Amazon Bedrock, DeepSeek, GitHub Copilot, LM Studio, Mistral, Ollama, OpenRouter, Vercel, Codex CLI, Claude Agent |
| Vscode Extension | ✓ | ✕ |