Cursor launched publicly in March 2023 and gained significant traction through the year. It is a code editor built from scratch around AI assistance, rather than an AI plugin added to an existing editor.
The design philosophy difference
GitHub Copilot is an extension that adds AI suggestions to existing editors. Cursor is an editor redesigned around AI interaction. The difference shows up in: multi-file edits that understand your intention across a codebase, a chat interface where you can reference specific files and functions, and the ability to apply AI suggestions across multiple files simultaneously from a single prompt. These interactions are awkward to retrofit into an existing editor's extension model but natural in a purpose-built interface.
Codebase-aware context
Cursor indexes your codebase and uses the index to provide relevant context for AI completions and chat responses. When you ask it to add a feature, it can read related files, understand your existing patterns, and generate code that fits your codebase style rather than generic code. The quality difference between codebase-aware generation and context-blind generation is substantial for anything beyond isolated functions.
The VS Code base
Cursor is built on the VS Code codebase (it maintains a fork). This means the extension ecosystem, debugging tools, and keybindings that VS Code users are familiar with work in Cursor. The migration cost from VS Code is low. The learning curve is for the AI interaction model, not the editor itself.
What it changed for other editors
Cursor demonstrated that users would switch editors for AI quality. This accelerated GitHub Copilot's development of Copilot Chat, VS Code's native AI features, and JetBrains' AI Assistant. The competitive pressure from an AI-native editor moved every major editor to accelerate their AI investment. That is the impact of a well-executed product challenge in developer tools.