Tech & AI, Explained

windsurf

6 min read

🇺🇸 USA · Windsurf (formerly Codeium Cascade)

Status: 🟩 COMPLETE 🟦 LIVING Last updated: 2026-06-26 Plain-English tagline: The other major AI-first code editor — Cursor’s closest direct competitor. Built by Codeium (rebranded as Windsurf), known for its agentic “Cascade” mode and aggressive free tier.

Front-matter facts

FieldValue
VendorWindsurf (formerly Codeium Inc) — Mountain View, USA
Country / origin🇺🇸 USA
Recommended for Australian users?✅ Yes — fully accessible from AUS, AUD card accepted
Privacy summaryFree + Pro: opt-in code retention; can disable. Teams + Enterprise: no training by default. SOC 2 audited.
Free tierYes — generous; full Cascade access on free Codeium completion, limited Windsurf model usage
Paid tiersPro US60/mo (heavier limits) · Teams US$35/user/mo · Enterprise quoted
First releasedCodeium (the original completion product) 2021; Windsurf editor (the IDE) November 2024
Last reviewed2026-06-26
Official sitehttps://windsurf.com

What it is

Windsurf is an AI-first code editor — Cursor’s closest direct competitor. Originally launched as Codeium (a free GitHub-Copilot-alternative completion plugin) in 2021, the company expanded into a full IDE in November 2024 under the name Windsurf, then formally rebranded the company to Windsurf in 2025.

Like Cursor, Windsurf is technically a fork of VS Code with AI rebuilt as the core interaction model. Its differentiators:

  • Cascade — Windsurf’s flagship agent mode; combines copilot-style suggestions with autonomous multi-step task completion
  • Flow — Cascade-meets-tab-autocomplete, predicts your next several edits across files
  • More-generous free tier than Cursor — Windsurf’s free Codeium completions remain genuinely usable for serious work
  • Wave model — Windsurf’s own optimised completion model (similar to Cursor’s proprietary completion model)
  • Pick-your-model for chat / Cascade — Claude Sonnet, Claude Opus, GPT-5, Gemini, Llama, Mistral
  • Strong privacy posture for completion (Codeium has always emphasised “your code is yours” as marketing)

Analogy: Cursor and Windsurf are like Coke and Pepsi — very similar products, slightly different feel, vocal user bases on each side. Most developers will be productive with either; preference often comes down to specific UX choices.

What you’d use it for

Same use cases as Cursor:

  • Day-to-day coding with AI as primary collaborator
  • Tab autocomplete + flow predictions
  • Inline AI rewriting (Cmd-I in Windsurf, vs Cursor’s Cmd-K)
  • Multi-file agent tasks via Cascade
  • Codebase chat with full context
  • Pick-your-model for different tasks

When you’d specifically prefer Windsurf over Cursor:

  • You’re a heavy free-tier user — Windsurf’s free tier (Codeium completions + limited Cascade) is more usable than Cursor’s
  • You prefer the Cascade agent UX over Cursor Composer
  • You want a slightly cheaper Pro tier (US20)
  • You’re an enterprise customer where Windsurf’s pricing model fits better

When you’d specifically prefer Cursor:

  • You value the larger user community / extension ecosystem
  • You prefer Cursor’s tab autocomplete UX
  • You want the more mature Composer agent
  • You want MCP support that’s currently more developed in Cursor

How to sign up + first 5 minutes from Australia

  1. Go to windsurf.com. Download Windsurf editor (Mac / Windows / Linux). Or, if you want completion-only, install the Codeium VS Code / JetBrains / Vim / Emacs extension from your editor’s marketplace.
  2. Open Windsurf, sign in with email / Google / GitHub.
  3. Free tier is active. You get Codeium completion (unlimited) + limited Cascade Premium model usage.
  4. Try one of these:
    • Open a code file; start typing. Codeium autocomplete will suggest multi-line completions.
    • Press Cmd-I (Mac) or Ctrl-I (Windows) to open Cascade chat with your codebase as context.
    • In Cascade, ask: “Read the codebase and tell me what this project does.”
    • Try an agentic task: “Add a new endpoint /api/users that returns a list of users from the database.”
  5. Optional — upgrade to Pro. Settings → Account → Upgrade → Pro. US$15/mo. AUD card accepted.

What it costs — what you actually get

Free tier

  • Unlimited Codeium completion (Codeium’s standalone product is genuinely free for individual developers — and the free tier of the editor includes it)
  • Limited Cascade Premium model requests per month (Claude, GPT, etc.)
  • Wave model (Windsurf’s own) for most general tasks
  • Limited file uploads / codebase indexing

Pro — US25-27 incl GST)

  • Unlimited Wave model usage
  • 500 Cascade Premium model requests / month
  • All model providers accessible
  • Higher codebase indexing limits
  • Privacy mode opt-in

Pro Ultimate — US$60/month

  • Everything in Pro + much higher Premium model quotas
  • For developers who hit Pro limits frequently

Teams — US$35/seat/month

  • Everything in Pro Ultimate
  • No training on your code
  • SSO, admin console
  • Shared workspaces
  • Higher rate limits

Enterprise — quoted

  • Everything in Teams
  • SOC 2 audit reports
  • Custom data residency
  • Self-hosted deployment option (rare among AI coding tools)
  • Customer-managed encryption keys

How it compares to alternatives

CapabilityWindsurf ProCursor ProClaude CodeGitHub Copilot
SurfaceFull IDEFull IDETerminal CLIIDE plugin
Tab autocompleteExcellent (Wave)Best (Cursor Small)N/AExcellent (Copilot)
Inline AI editCmd-I (excellent)Cmd-K (excellent)N/AInline chat
Agent modeCascade (excellent)Composer (excellent)Native (best)Copilot Agent (newer)
Free tier usabilityBestOKN/A (paid only)Limited free
Pro priceUS$15US$20Included in Claude ProUS$10
Model pickerClaude / GPT / Gemini / Llama / MistralSameClaude-focusedMultiple
Self-hosted optionYes (Enterprise)NoNoNo
Best forFree-tier user, value-consciousTab-autocomplete fans, larger ecosystemTerminal-first workflowLight plugin alternative

Many developers use both Cursor and Windsurf to compare for specific tasks; both are excellent. The choice often comes down to which UX feels better for your specific workflow.

Privacy / data handling

  • Free + Pro: opt-in code retention; default behaviour is configurable
  • Teams + Enterprise: no training on your code by default; contractually committed
  • SOC 2 Type II audited
  • Self-hosted Enterprise option — for organisations that can’t send code to any cloud
  • Codeium completion (the standalone product) has always emphasised privacy — long-standing marketing claim, generally borne out by audits

Same general posture as Cursor: turn on privacy mode for sensitive code; use Teams / Enterprise for business work.

Recent changes

  • 2026: Wave 2 model released; Cascade matured significantly
  • 2026: Claude Sonnet 4.6, GPT-5, Gemini 3 Pro all available in model picker
  • 2025: Codeium rebranded to Windsurf (the company name)
  • 2025: Self-hosted Enterprise option launched
  • November 2024: Windsurf editor launched (the IDE itself)
  • 2021: Codeium (the completion product) launched

Gotchas

  • Codeium and Windsurf are the same company, different products. Codeium = the completion plugin you install in VS Code / JetBrains / etc. Windsurf = the standalone IDE. Both work; they overlap somewhat.
  • Self-hosted Enterprise option is genuinely rare in this category — Cursor doesn’t offer it. If you’re an enterprise where code-must-never-leave-the-network is a hard requirement, Windsurf is one of the few choices.
  • Cascade agent can be aggressive — review diffs before accepting multi-file changes
  • Codeium’s free tier had a 2024 controversy over its terms briefly changing then reverting — currently the free tier is generous and properly limited; verify current state at windsurf.com
  • Model availability matches Cursor mostly — but the specific lineup can differ in which exact variants are accessible at which tier
  • Wave model performance varies vs Cursor Small — both labs iterate fast; relative quality shifts session to session

See also

Sources

Graph View

Backlinks