Free Repo Agent — Free AI Coding Agent, Copilot · Cursor · Claude Alternative for VS Code

A free AI coding agent and a free GitHub Copilot, Cursor & Claude alternative for VS Code — repository-aware chat, autonomous code editing, terminal command running, and pre-commit code review, powered by DeepSeek.

Free Repo Agent is a free, open AI coding assistant that brings a Claude/Cursor/Cline-style agent experience into VS Code. It understands your whole repository, writes and edits code with inline Keep / Undo review, runs terminal commands with your approval, auto-verifies its own work (runs your typecheck/build and fixes errors before finishing), tracks progress on a live Claude-style task checklist, extends itself with plugins (MCP) — GitHub, web search, Postgres, filesystem and more — shows its thinking, supports @ file mentions, vision (paste a screenshot/UI → build the component), image OCR and PDF uploads, keeps chat history/sessions, and runs a staff-engineer-grade pre-commit code review of your staged git changes — all on the affordable DeepSeek API.

Looking for a free Copilot alternative, free Cursor alternative, Cline / Continue alternative, or a free Claude / ChatGPT coding agent? This is a lightweight, bring-your-own-key option with no subscription.

📖 Full docs, all features & bug reports on GitHub → github.com/sumitsingh4411/repo-agent

🚀 Getting started

1. Get a DeepSeek API key

Repo Agent needs a DeepSeek API key to talk to the model.

1. Go to https://platform.deepseek.com/api_keys
2. Sign in (or create a free account).
3. Click Create new API key, give it a name, and copy the key (starts with sk-…). You won’t be able to see it again, so save it somewhere safe.
4. DeepSeek is pay-as-you-go and very low cost — add a small amount of credit under Billing on the same dashboard. A few dollars goes a long way.

💡 Models: deepseek-chat (fast, general) and deepseek-reasoner (shows reasoning / “thinking”). You can switch in settings.

2. Add your key to VS Code

Open the Command Palette (Cmd/Ctrl+Shift+P) and run:

Agent: Set DeepSeek API Key

Paste your key and press Enter. It’s stored securely in VS Code SecretStorage — never written to your code or settings.

Alternative: set the DEEPSEEK_API_KEY environment variable before launching VS Code.

3. Start using it

Open the chat any of these ways:

• Click the Repo Agent </> icon in the top-right of the editor toolbar (when a file is open) — this opens chat beside your code, on the right, like Cursor/Claude.
• Press Cmd/Ctrl+Shift+A.
• Click the Repo Agent icon in the Activity Bar (left sidebar).

The status bar shows when indexing is done and the key is set.

💡 Prefer it docked on the right? Show the Secondary Side Bar (Cmd/Ctrl+Alt+B), then drag the Repo Agent icon from the left Activity Bar into the right side bar. VS Code remembers the position.

✨ Features

🧑‍💻 How to use

Chat & generate

Type a question and Send. Toggle Generate code to produce files (you’ll get an Apply button with a diff preview before anything is written). Keep Think on to see the model reason through the answer.

• @ to reference files: type @ and pick a file from the dropdown — its contents are added to the context.
• 📎 to attach: click the paperclip to attach text files or PDFs.

Agent mode (autonomous)

Check Agent (run & edit) and describe a task, e.g.:

“Add a /health route and a test for it, then run the tests.”

The agent will:

1. Read relevant files, then propose edits — each shows inline in the file with green highlights and ✓ Keep / ✗ Undo buttons.
2. Ask to Run any terminal command (inline, in the chat) — commands run in a visible Repo Agent terminal.
3. When done, you get Keep all / Undo all to accept or revert the whole batch.

Use the Stop button anytime to interrupt.

Code review

Stage some changes (git add …), then run Agent: Review Staged Changes (also available from the Source Control title bar). Findings appear in the Problems panel, the Review Results sidebar, and inline — each with Fix with AI, Ignore, and Commit Anyway.

You can also review the current file or have it run automatically on save (see settings).

Custom review rules. Want the reviewer to enforce your team's standards? Run Agent: Create Review Guidelines (or click the link in the empty Review Results panel) to scaffold a system-design.md at your repo root. Fill it with your intended system design and concrete rules — naming, error handling, "no console.log", required tests, layering, no secrets, etc. The reviewer reads it before every review and flags any change that breaks a rule, quoting it. Configure the filename with repoAgent.review.guidelinesFile; remove the file to fall back to the default rubric.

Vision — paste an image, build the component (free)

DeepSeek is text-only, so image understanding uses a separate vision model — but it's free by default: it uses Google Gemini's free tier (no credit card). One‑time setup:

1. Click the 👁️ Vision button in the chat footer (or run Agent: Choose Vision Provider) and pick a backend:
   • Google Gemini — free (default, recommended): it opens the free‑key page; paste the key.
   • Ollama / LM Studio — local, no key: 100% free & private (needs a local vision model like llava).
   • OpenRouter (free models), OpenAI (paid), or Custom.
2. With Vision on, paste a screenshot/mockup into the input (or attach with +), type e.g. "build this as a React component", and send.

Behind the scenes the vision model turns the image into a precise implementation spec, then the agent builds the files from it. With Vision off (or no key set), attached images fall back to OCR — great for screenshots of code or error messages, and needs no key at all.

Project conventions

Drop a .agent.md or .claude.md file in your repo root with conventions, architecture notes, or rules — Repo Agent reads it and follows it. For code review specifically, add a system-design.md with rules the reviewer must enforce (see Custom review rules above).

⚙️ Commands

Open the Command Palette and type “Agent:” to see all of them:

🔧 Settings

All under repoAgent.* (Settings → search “Repo Agent”):

🔒 Privacy

• Your code is only sent to DeepSeek’s API when you make a request (chat, generate, review, or run the agent), using the base URL you configure.
• Your API key lives in VS Code SecretStorage, never in your repo.
• The local index is cached under .agent-cache/ (add it to .gitignore).
• Review the DeepSeek privacy policy for how the API handles data.

❓ Troubleshooting

• “Set your DeepSeek API key first.” Run Agent: Set DeepSeek API Key (see step 3).
• 401 Unauthorized Your key is wrong/revoked, or you’re out of credit — check https://platform.deepseek.com/api_keys and Billing.
• Agent says a command’s output “could not be captured.” That’s VS Code shell integration not being active — the command still ran in the terminal. It’s on by default for zsh/bash/pwsh in recent VS Code.
• No reasoning shown. “Thinking” requires deepseek-reasoner; it doesn’t apply to autonomous Agent mode (which uses tools).

🆚 A free alternative to GitHub Copilot, Cursor & Claude

Free Repo Agent gives you the agentic coding workflow people love in GitHub Copilot Chat, Cursor, Cline, Codex, and Claude — autonomous multi-file edits, terminal commands, codebase-aware answers, a live task checklist, self-verifying edits, MCP plugins, and inline diff review — without a monthly subscription. You bring your own DeepSeek API key (pay-as-you-go, typically a few cents of usage), and everything runs inside VS Code. It’s ideal if you want a free AI pair programmer, a free Copilot alternative, or a cheaper Cursor / Claude alternative for everyday coding and code review. If you’ve looked at Cline, Continue, Codeium, Windsurf, Tabnine, Cody, Aider, or Roo Code and want a simple, bring-your-own-key agent that edits code, self-verifies, and reviews diffs inside VS Code, Free Repo Agent is a lightweight alternative to all of them.

❓ FAQ

Is Free Repo Agent really free? Yes — the extension is free and open. You only pay DeepSeek’s low pay-as-you-go API usage (you bring your own key).

Is it a good GitHub Copilot / Cursor / Claude alternative? Yes. You get repo-aware chat, an autonomous coding agent that edits files and runs commands, visible reasoning, and pre-commit code review — the same core workflow, with no subscription.

Is it a free Cline / Continue / Aider alternative? Yes. Like Cline and Continue, it's an in-editor agent that reads your repo, edits multiple files, and runs commands — bring-your-own-key with DeepSeek, so there's no subscription. It adds a live task checklist, auto-verify/self-fix, and a staff-engineer code reviewer on top.

Does it fix its own mistakes? Yes — after editing it automatically runs your project's typecheck/build, reads the errors, and fixes them before finishing, so you don't get code that fails to compile.

Can I add plugins / MCP servers? Yes. Open the 🧩 Plugins panel in chat and add tools the agent can use — GitHub, web search, Postgres, filesystem, Puppeteer and more — with one click, or add any custom MCP server. Plugins use the Model Context Protocol (the same plugin system Claude uses), so the huge MCP ecosystem works here. (Requires Node/npx on your PATH.)

Do I need an API key? Yes — a DeepSeek API key from https://platform.deepseek.com/api_keys. Set it via Agent: Set DeepSeek API Key. It’s stored securely in VS Code SecretStorage.

Which models does it use? deepseek-chat for fast coding and deepseek-reasoner for visible step-by-step “thinking”.

Can it edit my code and run commands automatically? It proposes edits inline with Keep / Undo and asks before running any terminal command — you stay in control.

Does it work like an AI code reviewer? Yes — it reviews your staged git changes and reports Critical / Quality / Architecture / Testing findings, like a senior engineer. You can also give it custom review rules in a system-design.md file and it enforces your project's standards on every review.

Does my code leave my machine? Only the context needed for a request is sent to the DeepSeek API when you ask. Your key never leaves SecretStorage. See Privacy above.

License

MIT — see the bundled LICENSE file.

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