Cursor vs Windsurf

as AI assistants see them, week of 2026-10-12

brag about it: X · LinkedIn

Cursor comes out well ahead of Windsurf, with an overall score of 66 versus 25. Cursor shows up in 57 of 70 answers, Windsurf in 28 of 70. Both get named in every answer to "What are the top AI coding assistants in 2026?", but Cursor also sweeps questions on reliable code, whole-codebase agents, value for money, and free tools, while Windsurf never gets a mention for reliability, testing, beginners, or PR review. Head to head, Cursor is named more often in 15 of 20 shared questions, Windsurf in none, with 5 ties. Gemini rates them closest: 90 for Cursor, 54 for Windsurf.

Head to head

metric	Cursor	Windsurf
score	65	21
questions won	21	15

By assistant

Cursor

assistant	score	named in, this week	usual spot, this week
ChatGPT	70	80% of answers	#2.2
Claude	57	80% of answers	#3.6
Gemini	78	82% of answers	#2.7
Perplexity	62	74% of answers	#2.2

Windsurf

assistant	score	named in, this week	usual spot, this week
ChatGPT	12	20% of answers	#5.0
Claude	25	40% of answers	#6.1
Gemini	41	45% of answers	#5.4
Perplexity	16	11% of answers	#4.0

Where they differ

Only Cursor gets named for

What's the best AI coding assistant for a solo developer building a SaaS?
Which AI coding assistant is best for large codebases?
What's the best AI coding assistant for building mobile apps?
What are the best alternatives to Windsurf?
Which AI coding tool is best for writing tests?
What's the best AI coding assistant for beginners learning to code?
What's the best AI tool to review pull requests automatically?

Only Windsurf gets named for

What are the best alternatives to Cursor?

More comparisons

Not sold on either?

Scores count how often each assistant names a product, weighted by position. How the score works · Full AI coding assistants leaderboard