Cline

What is Cline?

Cline is an open-source, autonomous coding agent that runs as a VS Code extension and CLI under the Apache-2.0 licence, with Zed and Neovim support via the open Agent Client Protocol (ACP). Rather than selling a subscription by default, it is bring-your-own-key: you plug in your own model provider — Anthropic, OpenAI, Google, OpenRouter, AWS Bedrock, Azure, GCP Vertex, DeepSeek, xAI, Mistral, Cerebras or a local model via Ollama — and pay that provider directly for what you use. The core tool is free and fully inspectable, with roughly 65,000 GitHub stars and one of the largest open-source followings in the category. It also ships a free JetBrains plugin via the JetBrains Marketplace, on the same BYOK terms as the VS Code extension. Two optional paid layers now sit alongside that free core: a $9.99/month ClinePass subscription for discounted, higher-rate-limit access to a curated set of open-weight coding models, and a custom-priced Enterprise tier adding SSO/OIDC, an SLA, dedicated support and a centrally-managed JetBrains deployment. It reads your codebase, edits files, runs terminal commands and can drive a browser, asking for approval at each step.

What does Cline do?

You give Cline a task in the editor sidebar and it works agentically: it explores the repository, proposes and applies multi-file edits as reviewable diffs, runs shell commands with live output, and can drive a real browser via Puppeteer to test what it built. Its signature Plan/Act workflow separates thinking from doing — in Plan mode Cline reads the code, asks clarifying questions and lays out a strategy; once you approve, you flip to Act mode and it executes, requesting approval at each step (or auto-approving for hands-off runs). Because it is bring-your-own-key, you choose the model per task and can mix frontier models with cheap or local ones. First-class Model Context Protocol (MCP) support lets it connect to databases, APIs, cloud infrastructure and custom tools, and an MCP marketplace makes those one click to add. Beyond the editor it ships a CLI and an SDK, so the same agent runtime can be embedded in your own product or run headless in CI. It also offers a pay-as-you-go hosted "Cline Provider" for inference without managing your own keys, and — new since mid-2026 — an optional ClinePass subscription ($9.99/month, $4.99 the first month) giving 2-5x higher rate limits on curated open-weight models (Qwen, DeepSeek, Kimi, GLM and others); both coexist with plain BYOK rather than replacing it.

Key features

• Plan / Act modes: Separates strategy from execution — Cline plans and asks questions in Plan mode, then executes with step-by-step approval in Act mode.
• Bring-your-own-key, any model: Plug in Anthropic, OpenAI, Google, OpenRouter, Bedrock or a local Ollama model and pay the provider directly; the tool is free.
• First-class MCP support: Connect to databases, APIs and infrastructure through Model Context Protocol servers, with a marketplace for one-click installs.
• Editor, CLI & SDK: Run it as a VS Code/JetBrains extension, a terminal CLI, or embed the agent runtime in your own product via the SDK.
• Browser + terminal actions: Executes shell commands with live output and drives a real browser via Puppeteer to test its changes.

What are Cline's use cases?

• Cost-controlled coding: A developer routes routine edits to a cheap or local model and hard tasks to a frontier model, paying providers directly.
• Auditable, self-hosted agent: A security-conscious team runs a fully open-source agent locally with no code leaving to a vendor SaaS.
• Embed an agent in a product: A team uses the Cline SDK to ship the agent runtime inside their own tool or CI pipeline.

What does Cline integrate with?

• VS Code & free JetBrains extension, plus CLI (Zed/Neovim via ACP)
• Model providers — Anthropic, OpenAI, Google, OpenRouter, Bedrock, Azure, GCP Vertex, DeepSeek, xAI, Mistral, Cerebras, Ollama
• MCP servers & marketplace
• GitHub Actions / CI via CLI & SDK

Why use Cline?

• Fully open-source (Apache-2.0) and inspectable — no black box, no lock-in.
• No subscription: bring your own key and pay only your model provider’s usage.
• Model-agnostic and extensible via MCP, with editor, CLI and SDK surfaces.

Pros & cons

Cline pricing

• Open source (BYO key)Free
• Cline Provider (optional)Usage-based
• ClinePass (optional)$9.99 / /month
• EnterpriseCustom

See current pricing on cline.bot ↗Compare Cline alternatives →

Cline review

Cline is the reference open-source coding agent: Apache-2.0, bring-your-own-key, and available as a VS Code extension, a CLI and an embeddable SDK, with Zed/Neovim reachable via the open Agent Client Protocol. Its Plan/Act workflow and first-class MCP support make it both careful and unusually extensible, and because you supply the model you get full choice and transparent, usage-only cost — route cheap tasks to a local model and hard ones to a frontier model. Two optional paid layers now sit on top of that free core: a $9.99/month ClinePass for discounted open-weight-model rate limits, and a custom-priced Enterprise tier that adds an SLA, dedicated support and a centrally-managed JetBrains rollout for organizations — the JetBrains plugin itself is free and self-serve, same BYOK terms as VS Code. The flip side of BYO-key is that costs are unbounded on the core tier: a long agentic run on a top model can quietly rack up API spend, and you own all the setup, keys and troubleshooting yourself. Output quality is only as good as the model you plug in. Pick Cline if you value openness, control and no lock-in and are comfortable managing your own model access; skip the free tier if you specifically need a support SLA or centrally-managed rollout, and budget for Enterprise instead.

The open-source category leader — total control and no lock-in on the free core, including a free JetBrains plugin; only a real support SLA and centrally-managed rollout sit behind a paid Enterprise tier.

Frequently asked questions