WHAT IT IS
Claude Code is a coding tool Anthropic introduced in February 2025 that runs from the command line, able to read a codebase, edit multiple files and run commands. Unlike assistants that complete code line by line inside an editor, it takes a task description and plans and carries out multi-step changes on its own. Claude Code can be used as a terminal program and also offers editor-extension entry points.
Why it matters
It pushed coding assistants from line-by-line completion toward autonomous, multi-step tasks with the whole repository as context, a representative of the agentic coding tools that emerged in 2025.
Key specs
- Form
- Terminal CLI, plus editor extensions
- Models
- Anthropic’s Claude models
- Modality
- Text, code in; code out
Capabilities
Related concepts
Agents & Tool Use
Let a model do more than answer: search, call APIs, run code — and decide the next step from what came back
Prompting & Alignment
Making a model helpful, honest and harmless is harder than simply making it bigger
Inference Optimization & Serving
Training happens once; inference happens a billion times a day — and serving is torn between fast first tokens and high throughput, which usually pull against each other
Comparable products
GitHub Copilot
2021Completing and rewriting code in your editor from context
Cursor
2023A desktop code editor that treats the whole repository as context
Devin
2024An autonomous coding agent with its own shell, editor and browser