Trae

Overview

Trae (pronounced "tray") is ByteDance's entry into the AI-native code editor market. Built as a fork of VS Code and shipped under the ByteDance umbrella, Trae targets exactly the audience that adopted Cursor: developers who want AI tightly integrated into their editor but who balk at Cursor's pricing or want access to more model choices. Trae's headline feature is that it is free for far more usage than Cursor, with a paid tier that starts at just $3 per month.

ByteDance's strategy is aggressive distribution. Trae includes access to Claude, GPT, and ByteDance's own Doubao models, and the free tier is generous enough that hobbyists and many professionals never need to pay. The product has gained meaningful traction in 2025, particularly among developers in Asia and price-sensitive global markets.

Core Features

Trae's interface is familiar to anyone who has used Cursor or VS Code. The editor surface is essentially VS Code with AI panels grafted on - autocomplete, chat, and a Builder mode that handles multi-file changes similar to Cursor's Composer.

Builder is Trae's agentic mode. You describe a feature or task at a high level, and Builder plans, edits files, and verifies its work across the codebase. The newer SOLO mode (available on Pro and above) takes this further - it runs as a more autonomous agent that executes long-running tasks with less hand-holding.

Chat mode is the standard inline assistant for asking questions, generating code, or transforming selected snippets. Both modes are aware of your codebase through indexing.

Multi-model support is a major differentiator. Free users get access to a mix of Doubao and limited Claude/GPT usage. Paid plans unlock more frontier model usage, with different models consuming usage credits at different rates.

Cloud tasks let you offload work to remote agents that run in the background while you keep coding. Free includes 2 concurrent cloud tasks; Pro+ goes up to 15, and Ultra to 20.

Because Trae is a VS Code fork, all VS Code extensions, themes, and keybindings work without changes. This dramatically reduces the friction of switching.

Pricing Analysis

Trae's pricing is among the most aggressive in the category. Free includes 5,000 autocompletes and 2 concurrent cloud tasks. Lite at $3 per month adds $5 of basic usage plus bonus usage. Pro at $10 per month is comparable in scope to Cursor Pro at half the price, with $20 of basic usage, SOLO mode, and 10 concurrent cloud tasks. Pro+ at $30 per month and Ultra at $100 per month cater to power users with substantially more usage.

For most developers, the free tier or Pro at $10 per month is the sweet spot - half the cost of Cursor with similar capabilities.

Who Should Use Trae

Trae is the strongest choice for developers who want a Cursor-style experience at a lower price point, particularly those comfortable with ByteDance as a vendor. It is also a strong fit for developers who want access to ByteDance's Doubao models alongside Claude and GPT. Price-sensitive teams and developers in Asia get particular value.

It is less suited for organizations with restrictions on Chinese tech vendors due to data-residency or compliance concerns. US enterprise teams in regulated industries may prefer Cursor or Windsurf for that reason alone.