Cline review

Cline is an Apache 2.0 open-source coding agent from Cline Bot Inc., with more than 250 contributors and about 70,000 GitHub stars ^1,20. It started as a VS Code extension and now runs in JetBrains, a CLI, a desktop app, an SDK and a browser-based cloud agent ^1,4. The agent itself is free; Cline earns from inference credits, the ClinePass subscription and Enterprise contracts ^2,3.

Adoption is broad. The VS Code extension alone shows more than 5.5 million installs ²⁴. Samsung Electronics said it would adopt Cline for developers in its Device eXperience division ²⁶, and Salesforce built Agentforce Vibes on a fork of Cline's VS Code extension ²⁷. In 2026 Cline rebuilt its agent harness on the Cline SDK and released an open-source desktop app focused on open-weight models ¹⁸.

In the editor you describe a task, and Cline reads files, proposes edits and runs terminal commands, reacting to output as it streams ¹. Plan mode agrees an approach first; Act mode executes it ¹. Auto-approve settings decide which reads, edits, commands, browser actions and MCP tools run without asking, and YOLO mode approves everything ¹⁰. Every tool use creates a checkpoint in a shadow Git repository, so you can compare or restore files without touching your own history ¹¹. Rules files, skills, MCP servers and plugins with hooks extend the agent ¹.

The CLI runs interactively or headless for scripts and CI, and can auto-approve unattended runs ¹⁶. Through the Agent Client Protocol it also works inside Zed, JetBrains, Neovim and Emacs ¹⁷. Cloud Agents take a GitHub repo and a task from the browser, work in an isolated sandbox whose GitHub access is limited to that repo, push to a cline/ branch and open a pull request when asked ⁹.

The extension, CLI and desktop app cost nothing ². You pay for inference: bring your own key or local model, buy Cline credits charged at provider cost, or subscribe to ClinePass ^2,8. ClinePass costs $9.99 a month, plus a possible processing fee, and covers open-weight models such as GLM, Kimi, DeepSeek, MiniMax, MiMo and Qwen with quotas Cline puts at 2-5x standard API rate limits ³. Frontier models such as Claude or GPT are billed per token through credits or your own key, so the bill tracks how much you use them ^2,8. Cloud Agents are open to every user, with free models and a cap of 10 concurrent and 50 new sessions a day ^4,9. Enterprise, which adds SSO, role-based access, centralized billing, team dashboards and authentication logs, is quote-only ².

Cline runs client-side: the agent works on the developer's machine or a chosen remote host, reads files only when a task needs them, and does not index or embed repositories ¹³. With your own keys or a VPC deployment, prompts go straight to your provider and Cline does not see them ⁵. When you use Cline's inference, requests pass through its servers only to reach the model, and Cline says it never uses them for training ^5,6. Usage telemetry is on by default, leaves out code and prompts except for Cline and ClinePass provider requests, and can be switched off by users or locked off by Enterprise admins in the extensions ¹⁴. The trust center lists SOC 2 and GDPR but publishes only an auditor engagement letter ¹⁹. In February 2026 a stolen npm token was used to publish a tampered CLI release, and Cline later disclosed a critical flaw that let websites hijack its local Kanban server ^21,22.

Independent ratings are sparse. The VS Code extension holds 4.0 stars from 319 Marketplace ratings, with more than 5.5 million installs ²⁴. Gartner Peer Insights lists Cline in its Enterprise AI Coding Agents market with 3.5 stars from just two ratings ²⁵, and Cline has no entry on the public Terminal-Bench leaderboards ²⁸. Samsung Electronics said it would roll Cline out to developers in its Device eXperience division ²⁶, and Salesforce chose Cline as the base for Agentforce Vibes partly for its MCP support ²⁷.