Compare AI tools

	OpenRouter S	Claude S	Claude Code S	Cline A
Tagline	One API, every model. Pay-as-you-go, no subscriptions.	Anthropic's flagship — best reasoning + longest useful context.	Anthropic's CLI agent. Opus-powered, operates on your repo directly.	Open-source VS Code agent. Reads + writes + runs.
Category	Dev Platform	Chatbots	Coding	Coding
Pricing	Pay per token — model-dependent	Free + $20/mo Pro + team/enterprise	Part of Claude Pro/Max/Team plans	Free (open source) + your API costs
Best for	Developers experimenting across models. Apps that want fallback logic.	Long writing, code, careful thinking, documents over 50 pages.	Developers who want an agent, not autocomplete. Large refactors, tests, docs.	VS Code users who want agentic coding without changing IDEs.
Strengths	300+ models from one endpoint Automatic fallbacks between providers No subscription — just pay what you use	Best-in-class writing + nuanced reasoning 1M context on Opus Artifacts for code/docs Lowest hallucination rate in my testing	Runs locally, edits your actual files Strong on large codebases with 1M context Great at multi-step tasks	Free extension for VS Code Plan + Act modes Model-agnostic (Claude, GPT, local) Sees terminal output and iterates
Weaknesses	Slight markup over direct API Some provider features not exposed	Image generation is weak No native web search on all tiers	Terminal-based — learning curve Can't be used without Claude subscription	Can burn tokens fast if not watched Less polished than Cursor
Kai's verdict	S-tier for model-shopping. I use this for every prototype before committing.	S-tier for reasoning and writing. If you only pay for one chatbot, pay for this one — especially for long work.	S-tier if you live in the terminal. Different shape than Cursor — complementary, not replacement.	A-tier. Best free agentic option in VS Code. Use with Claude for best results.
Link	Open →	Open →	Open →	Open →