Claude Code changed how I write software. But it’s not the only CLI-based agentic coding tool out there. Here’s what else exists.
OpenAI Codex CLI
OpenAI’s answer to Claude Code. Install via npm i -g @openai/codex or brew install --cask codex. Works the same way—reads your repo, makes edits, runs commands.
The newest model, GPT-5.2-Codex, is designed specifically for agentic coding. It apparently reads files for 10-15 minutes before writing anything, which supposedly means fewer errors—Peter Steinberger claims it beats Claude Opus for larger tasks.
Included with ChatGPT Plus, Pro, Business, Enterprise, and Edu subscriptions.
Amp
Made by Sourcegraph. Available as CLI and in VS Code, Cursor, Windsurf, JetBrains, and Neovim. Mitchell Hashimoto (HashiCorp co-founder) uses Amp for his work on Ghostty.
Two modes: “smart” (Opus 4.5-powered) and “rush” (faster, cheaper). Has specialized agents like Oracle and Librarian, plus an agentic code review tool. MCP support with lazy-loading.
Pricing: pay-as-you-go with no markup, or $10/day in free credits if you opt into ads.
OpenCode
Open source with 50,000+ GitHub stars. Supports 75+ LLM providers—Claude, GPT, Gemini, local models, whatever you want. Available across terminal, desktop apps (macOS, Windows, Linux), and IDE extensions.
Key differentiator: privacy-first, doesn’t store your code or context. Multi-session support lets you run parallel agent instances on the same project. You can also share session links for collaboration.
Works with Claude Pro and Max accounts through Anthropic login.
Aider
The OG terminal-first AI pair programmer. 39,000+ GitHub stars, 4.1M pip installs. Works with Claude, GPT, DeepSeek, and local LLMs.
What makes it different: Git-native workflow. Aider automatically commits changes with descriptive messages. It maps your entire codebase for context and supports 100+ programming languages. Also has voice-to-code if you’re into that.
Gemini CLI
Google’s open source option (Apache 2.0). Free tier gives you 60 requests/min and 1,000 requests/day with a personal Google account, plus access to Gemini 2.5 Pro with a 1M token context window.
Uses a ReAct loop with built-in tools for Google Search, file operations, shell commands, and web fetching. MCP support included.
Armin Ronacher (creator of Flask) uses Gemini CLI inside Claude Code for certain tasks.
Pi
Less well-known but worth mentioning. Created by Mario Zechner. It’s actually a monorepo toolkit for building AI agents, but includes a coding agent CLI.
Unified LLM API that works with OpenAI, Anthropic, Google, and others. Also includes a Slack bot, web UI components, and vLLM pod management for deploying models on GPU infrastructure.
Armin Ronacher builds a tank game with Opus and Pi in his latest video.
The pattern: Claude Code is the default choice, but developers who want model flexibility gravitate toward OpenCode or Aider. Those deep in the OpenAI ecosystem use Codex. Google loyalists get a surprisingly capable free tier with Gemini CLI.
Most power users I’ve seen run multiple tools. Different models excel at different tasks. It’s worth experimenting with a few of these to find one that fits how you work—your communication style, the languages you use, and the frameworks you build with all affect which tool clicks. Someone doing Swift/iOS might have a different experience than someone building Svelte web apps.