Visual Studio Code vs OpenAI Codex CLI vs Zed vs Windsurf

Which one fits you in 2026? Traffic, pricing, input → output, tasks and community side by side.

Your tool
Visual Studio Code
vs
Competitor 1
OpenAI Codex CLI
Competitor 2
Zed
Competitor 3
Windsurf
Compare
4 tools · best value per row highlighted
Your tool Visual Studio Code
code.visualstudio.com
Visual Studio Code is a free, open source code editor that runs on Windows, macOS and Linux and now includes built-in AI agents.
Competitor OpenAI Codex CLI
developers.openai.com
OpenAI Codex CLI brings the Codex coding agent to the terminal and to scripts.
Competitor Zed
zed.dev
Speed meets intelligence
Competitor Windsurf
windsurf.com
Windsurf, which now appears on the web as Devin Desktop, is a desktop code editor that doubles as a control room for coding agents.
Traffic estimated monthly website traffic
Monthly visits
—
—
1.2Mvisits/mo
29.6Kvisits/mo
MoM change
—
—
▼ 18.1%
▲ 7.8%
6-month growth
—
—
+26.6%
+122.1%
Global rank web
—
—
#47,672
#1,172,623
Avg. last 3 months
—
—
1.5M
26.9K
Bounce rate lower is better
—
—
42%
50%
Pages / visit
—
—
2.8
1.3
Visit duration
—
—
1m 56s
13s
Traffic sources
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—
● Direct 80% · ● Referral 18%
—
Visual Studio CodeOpenAI Codex CLIZedWindsurf
0462K923.9K1.4M1.8MZed · 1.1MZed · 966.1KZed · 1.1MZed · 936.1KZed · 1.4MZed · 1.4MZed · 1.8MZed · 1.4MZed · 1.2MWindsurf · 16KWindsurf · 24.3KWindsurf · 15.7KWindsurf · 13.3KWindsurf · 25.4KWindsurf · 29.3KWindsurf · 23.6KWindsurf · 27.5KWindsurf · 29.6K10K100K1M10MZed · 1.1MZed · 966.1KZed · 1.1MZed · 936.1KZed · 1.4MZed · 1.4MZed · 1.8MZed · 1.4MZed · 1.2MWindsurf · 16KWindsurf · 24.3KWindsurf · 15.7KWindsurf · 13.3KWindsurf · 25.4KWindsurf · 29.3KWindsurf · 23.6KWindsurf · 27.5KWindsurf · 29.6KNov '25DecJan '26FebMarAprMayJunJul
Pricing
Model
Free
Paid
Freemium
Freemium
Starting price
Free
—
Free tier
$20per month · free tier available
Free tier
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Free trial
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–
–
API access
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–
–
Plans
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GPT-6-Astra $10GPT-6.1-Sol $2GPT-6-Luna $0.10GPT-Live-1 $0.05/minute+1 more
Personal FreePro $10/moBusiness $30/mo
Free FreePro $20/moMax $200/moTeams $80/mo
Capabilities input → output
Input
CodeText
CodeImagesText
CodeText
CodeText
Output
Code
Code
Code
Code
Skill level
Advanced
Advanced
Advanced
Advanced
Categories
Tasks what each tool can do · 1 shared · core   partial
Tasks covered
4
2
5
6
Coding
Debugging
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Developer tools
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Agent management
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Agents
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Code autocompletion
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Coding in VS Code
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Vs code
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–
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Development
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Code reviews
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Git commands
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GitHub pull requests
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–
–
Community on aitoolstime
Rating
no ratings yet
no ratings yet
no ratings yet
no ratings yet
Upvotes
▲ 0
▲ 0
▲ 0
▲ 1
Saves
0
0
0
0
Reviews
0
0
0
0
Prompts
0
0
0
0
Verified listing
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Traffic figures are third-party estimates for the tool's own domain; tools sharing a domain with a bigger product are not counted. Pricing is captured from each tool's site and may lag.