Claude Code vs Sourcegraph Cody: How They Actually Differ
Claude Code suits terminal-first solo developers who want an agent that edits files and ships PRs inside the Claude family. Sourcegraph Cody suits small teams sitting on a large monorepo who need semantic, search-grounded answers and a self-hosted option.
Compiled 2026-08-29 from our catalogue entries for Claude Code and Sourcegraph Cody.
The short answer
- Pick Claude Code if
- You work in the terminal, want first-class Opus, Sonnet, and Haiku support, and need MCP, skills, hooks, or slash commands to encode your own workflow.
- Pick Sourcegraph Cody if
- You have a large monorepo and want semantic, regex, and structural search grounded in your own code, with a self-hosted Enterprise option to keep source on your own infrastructure.
- Cheapest way in
- Claude Code Free at $0. Sourcegraph Cody is listed as freemium, but its starting price is not recorded.
- What we could not compare
- Sourcegraph Cody has no verified plans on file, so we cannot line up plan tiers, seat counts, or monthly numbers against Claude Code's Free, Pro, and Max plans.
Claude Code is Anthropic's official command-line agent for Claude. It edits files, runs commands, and ships pull requests from the terminal, with optional VS Code and JetBrains extensions listed among its platforms. Its edge is depth on Claude: first-class Opus, Sonnet, and Haiku support, native MCP as both client and server, and skills, hooks, and slash commands for custom workflows. The trade-off in the sheet is that it is locked to Anthropic models, with no GPT or Gemini out of the box.
Sourcegraph Cody is a code-search and AI assistant from Sourcegraph. Where Claude Code leads with terminal agent actions, Cody leads with search: it indexes very large monorepos for semantic, regex, and structural search and feeds that context to the model, which the sheet says reduces hallucinations on internal APIs. A self-hosted Enterprise option keeps source code on customer infrastructure. The trade-offs are that self-hosted setup and indexing are non-trivial, and pricing shifts from per-seat to an enterprise contract at scale.
Side by side
Every cell is a field on our catalogue entry for that tool, copied as recorded. Rows where the two differ come first; blank fields say so rather than being filled in.
| Claude Code | Sourcegraph Cody | |
|---|---|---|
| Pricing model | Paid | Freemium |
| Starts at | Free — $0 | Not recorded |
| Runs on | web, mac, win, linux, cli, vscode-ext, jetbrains-plugin | vscode-ext, jetbrains-plugin, web |
| Category | AI Coding Agents | AI Coding Agents |
| Public source code | No public repo listed | No public repo listed |
| Public docs | Not listed | Not listed |
- Public source code: From the repository link on each catalogue entry, not a licence audit.
Where Claude Code is the better fit
- First-class support for Anthropic Claude Opus, Sonnet, and Haiku.
- MCP server protocol is natively supported as both client and server.
- Skills, hooks, and slash commands let teams encode workflow primitives.
Where Sourcegraph Cody is the better fit
- Indexes very large monorepos for semantic, regex, and structural search.
- Self-hosted Enterprise option keeps source code on customer infrastructure.
- Combines code-search context with LLM answers, reducing hallucinations on internal APIs.
Which one should you pick?
Free $0 entry, Pro from $17/month annual or $20 monthly, Max from $100/month, and a CLI-first agent that edits files and ships PRs without leaving the shell.
Semantic, regex, and structural search across the codebase feeds grounded answers, and the self-hosted Enterprise option keeps source on customer infrastructure.
The fact sheet says Claude Code is locked to Anthropic models, with no GPT or Gemini out of the box. Sourcegraph Cody's supported models are not recorded on file.
Frequently asked questions
- Is there a free tier?
- Claude Code lists a Free plan at $0. Sourcegraph Cody is listed as freemium, but its starting price is not recorded.
- Which one has a self-hosted option?
- Sourcegraph Cody lists a self-hosted Enterprise option that keeps source code on customer infrastructure. The fact sheet does not mention a self-hosted option for Claude Code.
- Can I use models from more than one provider?
- The fact sheet says Claude Code is locked to Anthropic models, with no GPT or Gemini support out of the box. Sourcegraph Cody's model coverage is not recorded on file.
- Which platforms do they run on?
- Claude Code lists web, mac, win, linux, cli, vscode-ext, and jetbrains-plugin. Sourcegraph Cody lists vscode-ext, jetbrains-plugin, and web.
What we compared
This page states nothing that is not in the two catalogue entries below. The exact text used to write it is reproduced here so you can check our reading, and both tools link through to their own pages and to the vendor.
- /tools/claude-code — checked 2026-05-25 · official site
- /tools/sourcegraph-cody — checked 2026-05-25 · official site
Show the source text
## Claude Code (/tools/claude-code) Tagline: Anthropic's official CLI agent for Claude — runs in the terminal, edits files, executes commands, and ships PRs. Category: AI Coding Agents Pricing model: paid Starts at: Free — $0 Platforms: web, mac, win, linux, cli, vscode-ext, jetbrains-plugin Public repo: none listed Docs: none listed Verified plans (read 2026-08-24): Free $0 | Pro $17 / month with annual subscription discount, or $20 if billed monthly | Max (5x or 20x) From $100 / month Strengths on file: First-class support for Anthropic Claude Opus, Sonnet, and Haiku.; MCP server protocol is natively supported as both client and server.; Skills, hooks, and slash commands let teams encode workflow primitives. Limits on file: Locked to Anthropic models — no GPT or Gemini support out of the box.; Terminal-first UX has a learning curve for developers expecting an IDE. Claude Code is Anthropic's official command-line agent for Claude — it runs in the terminal, edits files, executes commands, and ships pull requests. Its strength is depth on Claude and extensibility: first-class support for Opus, Sonnet, and Haiku, native MCP as both client and server, and skills, hooks, and slash commands that let teams encode their own workflow primitives. It's for developers comfortable in the terminal who want an agent that acts, not just autocompletes. Two trade-offs: it's locked to Anthropic models — no GPT or Gemini out of the box — and the terminal-first UX has a learning curve if you're expecting an IDE. In the stack it's the terminal-first agent next to IDE-native Cursor and the open, model-agnostic Aider. ## Sourcegraph Cody (/tools/sourcegraph-cody) Tagline: Code-search and AI assistant by Sourcegraph — semantic search across enterprise codebases plus inline coding help. Category: AI Coding Agents Pricing model: freemium Starts at: Not recorded Platforms: vscode-ext, jetbrains-plugin, web Public repo: none listed Docs: none listed Verified plans: none on file Strengths on file: Indexes very large monorepos for semantic, regex, and structural search.; Self-hosted Enterprise option keeps source code on customer infrastructure.; Combines code-search context with LLM answers, reducing hallucinations on internal APIs. Limits on file: Setup and indexing for self-hosted deployment is non-trivial.; Pricing shifts from per-seat to enterprise contract at scale. Sourcegraph Cody is a code-search and AI assistant from Sourcegraph — semantic search across large codebases paired with inline coding help. Its differentiator is search-grounded answers: it indexes very large monorepos for semantic, regex, and structural search and feeds that context to the model, which cuts hallucinations on internal APIs. A self-hosted Enterprise option keeps source on your own infrastructure. It fits enterprises with big codebases that want AI grounded in their own code and control over where it runs. Caveats: self-hosted setup and indexing are non-trivial, and pricing moves from per-seat to an enterprise contract at scale. It's the code-search-first assistant, where Copilot and Cursor lead with completion and editing.
Change log
- 2026-08-29 — First published, compiled from the catalogue entries for Claude Code and Sourcegraph Cody.