Cline vs Devin
A side-by-side comparison of Cline and Devin, two Agent tools, drawn from Ignaite's continuously-verified listings.
Compared from listings verified as of
At a glance
| Attribute | Cline | Devin |
|---|---|---|
| Category | Agent | Agent |
| Pricing (differs) | BYO KEY | PAID |
| License (differs) | Open source | Proprietary |
| Deployment (differs) | Local | Cloud |
| Platforms (differs) | VS Code extension | Web |
| Model support (differs) | BYO key / model | Single model (proprietary) |
| Vendor (differs) | Cline Bot Inc. | Cognition AI |
| Capabilities (differs) |
|
|
The honest brief
Cline
BYO-key VS Code agent that shows and asks approval for every edit and command — no markup, no lock-in.
- No vendor markup on token costs
- Approves every edit/command before running
- Bring any model (Claude, local, etc.)
- Plan/Act split for review before changes
- BYO-key means you pay provider token costs
- VS Code only, no standalone IDE
- Slower than Cursor on equivalent tasks
- No codebase indexing or background agents
Devin
Runs asynchronously in its own cloud sandbox aimed at whole tickets, not autocomplete — plans, codes, and opens a PR.
- Autonomous, async whole-ticket work
- Own sandbox: browser, terminal, editor
- Submits PRs end-to-end
- Good for long-horizon tasks
- Closed model and harness
- Hosted-only, no self-host
- Premium-priced
- Reliability varies on complex tickets
When to pick which
Both cover Autonomous coding agent.
Pick Cline if you need Code generation, MCP server, and Multi-agent orchestration.
- Code generation (primary capability)
- MCP server (primary capability)
- Multi-agent orchestration (secondary capability)
Pick Devin if you need Test generation and Browser automation.
- Test generation (secondary capability)
- Browser automation (secondary capability)
They also differ on:
- Pricing
- BYO KEY · PAID
- License
- Open source · Proprietary
- Deployment
- Local · Cloud
- Platforms
- VS Code extension · Web
- Model support
- BYO key / model · Single model (proprietary)