OpenAI Codex vs Windsurf

as AI assistants see them, week of 2026-09-14

brag about it: X · LinkedIn

OpenAI Codex and Windsurf land close in overall score, 21 versus 25, but AI assistants reach for them differently. Codex shows up in 22 of 70 answers, favored most for whole-codebase agents and terminal work, where it's named in 3 of 3 answers. Windsurf is named slightly more often, in 28 of 70 answers, and dominates the "top AI coding assistants" and "best AI code editor" questions with 4 of 4 each. Head-to-head, Windsurf comes out ahead in 8 questions versus Codex's 5, with 7 ties. By assistant, Codex scores highest with ChatGPT (37), while Windsurf's strongest backer is Gemini (54).

Head to head

metric	OpenAI Codex	Windsurf
score	21	25
questions won	12	11

By assistant

OpenAI Codex

assistant	score	named in, this week	usual spot, this week
ChatGPT	37	55% of answers	#4.2
Claude	30	45% of answers	#4.3
Gemini	0	0% of answers
Perplexity	8	10% of answers	#3.0

Windsurf

assistant	score	named in, this week	usual spot, this week
ChatGPT	11	20% of answers	#7.0
Claude	26	45% of answers	#5.9
Gemini	54	80% of answers	#4.3
Perplexity	24	35% of answers	#4.0

Where they differ

Only OpenAI Codex gets named for

What's the best AI coding assistant that works in the terminal?
Which AI coding tool is best for writing tests?
Which AI coding assistant is best for professional developers?
Which AI coding assistant is best for large codebases?
Which AI coding tool writes the most reliable code?

Only Windsurf gets named for

What are the best free AI coding assistants?
What's the best AI tool for writing and fixing React and Next.js code?
What's the best AI coding assistant for VS Code?
What's the best AI coding assistant for Python?

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