Startup Cursor today debuted a new version of its popular artificial intelligence coding platform.

The release includes features that will make it easier for developers to automate programming tasks using AI agents. It also introduces improvements in other areas.

Cursor, officially Anysphere Inc., has raised more than $3 billion in funding from Nvidia Corp., Google LLC and other prominent backers. It provides a code editor that uses AI to automate tasks such as building new application features and debugging existing ones. The tool is powered by not only off-the-shelf large language models such as Claude but also algorithms that Cursor has developed in-house.

Cursor 3, the new platform release that debuted today, adds a chatbot interface. It enables developers to enter a natural language description of the feature they wish to build and specify the LLM that should carry out the task. Cursor 3 generates the requested code along with a demo video that shows how it works.

The new chatbot interface uses multiple AI agents to complete user-specified tasks. Some of those agents run in the cloud, while others are installed on the user’s local machines. Developers can centrally manage both agent varieties through a newly added sidebar.

Cursor’s cloud-based agents have access to more hardware resources than ones that run on workstations. As a result, a large number of them can run in parallel to speed up time-consuming tasks. Desktop agents are slower, but they enable developers to locally open the code being generated, edit it manually and run tests.

Cursor 3 enables users to switch between the two modes. A developer could have a set of cloud-based agents generate a piece of code and then send it to a desktop-based agent for local editing. Cursor says that Composer 2, an internally developed LLM it debuted last month, is particularly well-suited for such tasks. The model is more cost-efficient than several of the other LLMs supported by the platform.

When developers are using Cursor to edit a user interface, they can activate a newly added Design Mode to speed up the workflow. The feature makes it possible to select interface elements and add natural language text that describes how they should be changed. Cursor’s AI agents automatically implement the requested modifications.

The platform displays a step-by-step overview of each task that it completes. Cursor provides a natural language explanation of every substep, highlights any errors that may have cropped up and provides screenshots of its work. Developers can adjust the workflow by typing in feedback.

Cursor 3 also introduces several other improvements. According to the company, a new shortcut enables developers to send a request to multiple LLMs and pick the best response. Another enhancement speeds up the process of reviewing code changes before rolling them out to production.

Image: Cursor