ClinevsTabby
Generated from the two spec rows. Green marks the better value where a spec has a clear direction. Everything else is just different.
Cline
Cline Bot Inc. · IDE extension
#11OSSMCP
Panel
6.89 spec wins
- Reliability
- 6.8
- Usefulness
- 7.2
- Cost
- 6.3
- Longevity
- 6.8
“Asks permission before every command, which is why your first move is finding the auto-approve list.”
Tabby
TabbyML · IDE extension
#107OSS
Panel
6.70 spec wins
- Reliability
- 6.7
- Usefulness
- 5.8
- Cost
- 7.3
- Longevity
- 7.0
“It ships a Vim extension, so the two least agreeable crowds in software finally have something in common.”
Spec by spec
| Spec | Cline | Tabby |
|---|---|---|
| Architecture | ||
| Category | IDE extension | IDE extension |
| Runs | local | local |
| Platforms | macos, linux, windows | macos, linux, windows |
| Context window | not documented | not documented |
| Protocols | ||
| MCP client | Yes | No |
| MCP server | No | No |
| Capabilities | ||
| Runs terminal commands | Yes | No |
| Multi-file edits | Yes | No |
| Git operations | Yes | No |
| Browser control | YesBrowser control lives in the IDE extension, which drives Chrome over the DevTools protocol with puppeteer-core; the CLI's ClineCore tool set only has fetch_web. | No |
| Sandboxed execution | NoThe CLI's CLINE_SANDBOX mode only redirects session, database and provider state to a separate data directory; there is no container, VM or OS-level isolation in the repository. | No |
| Multi-agent orchestration | Yes | No |
| Headless / CI mode | Yes | No |
| Models | ||
| Backbone | Anthropic, OpenAI, Google, OpenRouter, Cline provider, Ollama, LM Studio | any |
| Bring your own model | Yes | Yes |
| Local models | Yes | Yes |
| Cost | ||
| Pricing model | mixed | free |
| Starts at | $0/mo | n/a |
| Free tier | Yes | Yes |
| Bring your own key | Yes | No |
| Openness | ||
| Open source | Yes | Yes |
| License | Apache-2.0 | Apache-2.0, with the ee/ directory under a separate enterprise licence |
| GitHub stars | 69,688 | 33,886 |
Which one would each critic pick
| Critic | Cline | Tabby | Pick |
|---|---|---|---|
| El Juez | — | — | not enough reviews |
| El Amigo | 7.5 | 7.0 | Cline — The open editor agent to pick if you want to approve every action and choose your own model; slower than the closed tools, and yours. |
| El Crítico | 6.5 | 6.3 | Cline — Approvals slow it down by design, the bill scales with how much it reads, and there is no sandbox behind the approve button. |
| El Profesor | 6.3 | 6.8 | Tabby — The index spans repositories, issues and merge requests, so retrieval covers the discussion around code rather than the code alone, which is an unusual and defensible scope choice. |
| La Inversora | 5.8 | 6.3 | Tabby — TabbyML publishes no price at all, which for an on-premises product with thirty-four thousand stars means the deals are negotiated one at a time and nothing is repeatable yet. |
| La Jefa | 5.8 | 6.0 | Tabby — The software costs nothing and the real budget line is graphics hardware plus a named owner on call, which is the cost every self-hosted pitch leaves out. |
| El Hacker | 9.0 | 8.0 | Cline — Apache-2.0, every prompt readable, any OpenAI-compatible endpoint including my local box, MCP from a JSON file; this is what ownership looks like. |
Picks are derived from each critic's own scores. Humans vote on matchups on the duels page.