Cursor AI is Revolutionizing Software Development

Software development will never be the same again.

This week, I’ve seen numerous videos of people building apps without writing a single line of code. Some are even using voice assistants to build apps, eliminating the need to touch the keyboard entirely.

In one particularly impressive example, Ricky, a father of an 8-year-old, shared a video on X (formerly Twitter) of his daughter building an app in just 45 minutes. And she didn’t even write a single line of code!

How is this possible?

The answer lies in the remarkable progress of AI-powered coding assistants, and one of the most notable ones right now is Cursor AI.

What is Cursor AI?

Cursor AI is a coding assistant built on top of Microsoft’s Visual Studio Code (VS Code). It enhances the coding experience by understanding your code, suggesting improvements, and even writing code for you.

Yes, it scans and indexes your entire project to gain a comprehensive understanding of how everything in your codebase is connected. This allows it to pinpoint or refer to specific files or documentation during programming or debugging.

Aside from the context understanding of your code base, Cursor is also really good in natural language processing (NLP). You can use commands (like Ctrl+K) to describe what you want in simple terms, and the AI will generate the necessary code. Based on your input, it can suggest or create complex code structures that fit your project needs.

So, what does that mean for non-dev people?

Given that all you need is an IDE, Cursor AI, and an internet connection, you can essentially create fully functional web applications without prior programming experience.

The rest of this article will guide you on how to setup and use Cursor AI and walk you through its basic features.

Let’s get started.

Setting up Cursor AI

To get started, head over to cursor.com and download the installer for free.

Now, you might be wondering: Why Cursor isn’t available as a VS Code extension?

The creators explained that Cursor, as a standalone application, has more control over the UI of the editor, enabling deeper AI integration. Features like Cursor Tab and CMD-K wouldn’t be possible as plugins in existing coding environments. This decision allows the tool to offer a more seamless and integrated experience.

Once Cursor is installed, you’ll notice that it still looks like VS Code, but the icon on the upper left side is different.

To bring up the chat section, hit CMD+L, and it will appear on the right side of the editor.

From there, you can start interacting with the AI. Currently, there are five language models to choose from in the dropdown menu, but I’d recommend sticking with GPT-4o or Claude 3.5 Sonnet for the best results.

And here’s some good news — when you sign up, Cursor gives you a two-week trial with 2,000 completions, so you don’t have to worry about paying for a subscription right away. This should be more than enough to get a good feel for what the tool can do.

How Cursor Works

The best way to showcase Cursor AI is through a demonstration.

In the example below, I have an ongoing project called AI-SaaS with a basic Prisma schema, and I wanted to add a new model.

First, I opened the file schema.prisma, so Cursor knows which file it needs to modify. Then, I hit CTRL+L to bring up the chat UI and described what I wanted to achieve.

Prompt: I have this base prisma schema. I have a feature called AI Article generator where user can generate an article by text prompt and the AI will generate an article based on the prompt. I want to save the article and the text prompt so that when user checks the history, the articles along with the prompt will be retrieved from the database. Can you update the schema to accommodate this request?

Cursor understood the task and made the following suggestions to the schema. It added a new AIArticle model and linked it to the User model to track who generated each article.

// ... existing code ...

model User {
 id                    String    @id @default(cuid())
 name                  String?
 email                 String?   @unique
 emailVerified         DateTime?
 image                 String?
 password              String?
 passwordResetToken    String?   @unique
 passwordResetTokenExp DateTime?
 accounts              Account[]
 sessions              Session[]
 aiArticles            AIArticle[] // Add this line
}

// ... existing code ...

model AIArticle {
 id        String   @id @default(cuid())
 prompt    String
 content   String   @db.Text
 createdAt DateTime @default(now())
 updatedAt DateTime @updatedAt
 userId    String
 user      User     @relation(fields: [userId], references: [id], onDelete: Cascade)
}

I reviewed the changes, and they looked good, so all I had to do was click the Apply button.

Cursor automatically added the changes to the file and even highlighted the modified sections of the code.

One of the things I really appreciate about Cursor AI is how it tracks your conversations. All your interactions are saved in the history page, so you can easily reference previous prompts and code suggestions.

Additionally, if you run into any errors during the build or execution process, there’s an option called “Debug with AI,” which can help you quickly identify and fix the issue.

Awesome! This is incredibly powerful and could save me countless hours of frustration.

My Experience with Cursor AI

As someone who’s been programming for over a decade, I’ve witnessed the evolution of development tools firsthand. Recently, I switched from GitHub Copilot to trying out Cursor with Claude 3.5 Sonnet, and it’s been amazing.

Over the past few days, I’ve noticed that a significant portion of my “programming” now involves writing in English — prompting the AI, reviewing, and refining the generated code changes.

To clarify, I’m not fully reliant on AI. Instead, I use a hybrid approach that I like to call “half-coding.” I start by writing the initial code chunk, adding comments to guide the AI, and then using auto-completions and suggestions.

This approach has sped up my workflow considerably. Sometimes, the AI generates a 100-line code change that would have taken me over 30 minutes to write manually.

I am not a web developer but AI now allows me to build and deploy web apps. Soon, I hope to ship one of these apps as real products and turn it into a business.

That being said, it’s important to acknowledge that there’s a learning curve. It’s almost like learning to code all over again, but honestly, I can’t imagine going back to coding without AI assistance.

How Much Does it Cost?

One of the things I appreciate about Cursor AI is the generous free credits. When you sign up, you get access to the Pro version, which includes the following benefits:

• Pro features for two weeks
• 2,000 completions
• 50 slow premium requests
• 200 cursor small uses

The free credits should be enough to test out all the features and build simple web apps. However, if you’re planning on creating more complex projects with advanced features, you might want to consider upgrading to one of the paid tiers:

• Pro: Priced at $20 per month, this plan includes everything in the Hobby tier but adds unlimited completions, 500 fast premium requests per month, unlimited slow premium requests, unlimited cursor-small uses, and 10 Claude Opus uses per day.
• Business: This tier costs $40 per user per month and encompasses all Pro features, along with centralized billing, an admin usage dashboard, enforced privacy mode, and OpenAI or Anthropic zero-data retention policies

Final Thoughts

Overall, Cursor AI is a solid tool, but it’s not perfect. Where it really shines is when you’ve already got some code written and you need a hand finishing things up. If you’ve got 80% of the code done, Cursor AI can help you knock out the last 20%.

If you’re starting from scratch and don’t know much about coding, it might not be the best tool to rely on. It’s still important to learn the basics of programming and understand what’s going on under the hood. That way, when Cursor AI offers a suggestion, you can decide if it’s the best piece of code for your project.

Recently, I have already written articles about AI tools that work similarly with Cursor AI—Claude Dev and Devin. There’ll be more and more coding assistants that will be released in the coming weeks, and every iteration is more powerful and more capable. It is up to us to use these tools as assistants and not be fully reliant to avoid half-baked and buggy software applications.

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