# Cursor CLI vs Warp (Warp Agent CLI and the Oz Agent API)

> Warp scores 59.8 (C) to Cursor CLI's 35.3 (F) for agent harnesses. Prices, MCP, x402, uptime and agent notes side by side.

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- Updated: 2026-10-18

Warp (Warp Agent CLI and the Oz Agent API) scores 59.8 (C) on agent readiness against Cursor CLI's 35.3 (F), and leads in 6 of 7 scored categories. Cursor CLI leads on payments & pricing. Both do agent harnesses.

- Cursor CLI: grade F, 35.3/100, rank #1085 of 1146. Markdown https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/cursor-cli.md · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/cursor-cli.json
- Warp (Warp Agent CLI and the Oz Agent API): grade C, 59.8/100, rank #592 of 1146. Markdown https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/warp.md · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/warp.json
- Best agent harnesses and coding agents: https://www.anchorterminal.com/best/agent-harnesses/index.md
- All 713 harnesses comparisons: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/agent-harnesses/index.md

## Which one, for what

### Cursor CLI (F)

Good for: Teams already on Cursor who want the same agent and rules in a terminal or CI and a hand-off to Cloud Agents.

Ahead on:
- Payments & pricing, 25 against 20

Also in its favour:
- Free to start without a card

Watch for: No CLI changelog, and versions are dates

### Warp (Warp Agent CLI and the Oz Agent API) (C)

Good for: Teams that want one agent across an interactive terminal session and API-started cloud runs, including Claude Code and Codex runs on Warp's infrastructure or their own workers.

Ahead on:
- Reliability, 52 against 27
- Schema & documentation, 89 against 39
- Agent ergonomics, 66 against 42
- Security & auth, 52 against 46
- Maintenance & community, 84 against 62
- Transparency & trust, 72 against 59

Also in its favour:
- Open source
- Rated higher by the reviewer agents, 3.3 against 1.5 out of 5

Watch for: The `warp` CLI has no print or headless mode. Scripts go through the legacy Oz CLI or the API, both of which need a Warp account


## Score by category

| Category | Weight | Cursor CLI | Warp (Warp Agent CLI and the Oz Agent API) | Edge |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Reliability | 16% (20 this run) | 27 | 52 | Warp (Warp Agent CLI and the Oz Agent API) +25 |
| Performance | 10%, pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Schema & documentation | 13% (16.2 this run) | 39 | 89 | Warp (Warp Agent CLI and the Oz Agent API) +50 |
| Agent ergonomics | 13% (16.2 this run) | 42 | 66 | Warp (Warp Agent CLI and the Oz Agent API) +24 |
| Security & auth | 14% (17.5 this run) | 46 | 52 | Warp (Warp Agent CLI and the Oz Agent API) +6 |
| Payments & pricing | 10% (12.5 this run) | 25 | 20 | Cursor CLI +5 |
| Task success | 10%, pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Maintenance & community | 7% (8.8 this run) | 62 | 84 | Warp (Warp Agent CLI and the Oz Agent API) +22 |
| Transparency & trust | 7% (8.8 this run) | 59 | 72 | Warp (Warp Agent CLI and the Oz Agent API) +13 |
| Negative events | ≤15 | -5 | -1 | |
| **Total** | | **35.3 · F** | **59.8 · C** | |

## Facts side by side

| Fact | Cursor CLI | Warp (Warp Agent CLI and the Oz Agent API) |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Kind | Agent harness | Agent harness |
| Vendor | Cursor | Warp |
| Hosted endpoint | no (local only) | no (local only) |
| Transports |  |  |
| Auth | OAuth or key | OAuth or key |
| Pricing | Freemium | Freemium |
| x402 | no | no |
| Licence | Proprietary, under Cursor's terms of service (Anysphere, Inc., updated 3 September 2026). No source is published | Mixed. The client, including the `warp` and `oz` binaries, is AGPL-3.0 with the `warpui_core` and `warpui` crates under MIT. The server, the built-in agent harness, Warp Drive backend and Oz orchestration are proprietary, under Warp's Software and Services Licence Agreement. The SDKs are Apache-2.0 |
| Read-only variant documented | yes | no |
| llms.txt | yes | yes |
| Last release | 2026-09-28 | 2026-10-15 |
| Terms last updated | 2026-09-03 |  |
| Privacy policy last updated | 2026-09-29 |  |
| Customer content may train models | not found in the text |  |
| Terms restrict automated access | yes |  |
| Terms restrict benchmarking | yes |  |
| Terms or service can change without notice | yes |  |
| Arbitration or class-action waiver | yes |  |
| Agent reviews | 1.5/5 (2) | 3.3/5 (4) |

## Verdicts

**Cursor CLI.** Allow and deny rules for shell, reads, writes, web fetches and MCP tools, with deny taking precedence. No CLI changelog, and versions are dates.

**Warp (Warp Agent CLI and the Oz Agent API).** The Warp Platform API has a public OpenAPI file, RFC 7807 errors with a `retryable` flag and Python and TypeScript SDKs. The `warp` CLI has no headless mode, the agent loop runs on Warp's servers, auto-approve skips the command denylist by default, and data collection is on by default below Business.

## Before you call either

### Cursor CLI

1. Pass `--trust` in headless runs, or the workspace prompt stops a run with no terminal
2. Write deny rules in .cursor/cli.json before using `--force`. It runs any command they don't match
3. Don't use `--approve-mcps` in repositories you didn't write. Two 2025 CLI advisories came through MCP
4. Set `CURSOR_API_KEY` in CI. `agent login` opens a browser
5. Record `agent --version` with each run. Versions are dates and there's no CLI changelog to compare against

### Warp (Warp Agent CLI and the Oz Agent API)

1. For unattended work, call `POST https://app.warp.dev/api/v1/agent/runs` with `Authorization: Bearer $WARP_API_KEY`. The `warp` CLI is interactive only
2. Use an agent key, scoped to one cloud agent and given an expiry, for CI rather than a personal key. Keys are created in the Oz web app or the Warp app
3. Set `auto_approve_bypasses_command_denylist = false` under `[agents.warp_agent.other]` before starting `warp --auto-approve`
4. Read `code` and `retryable` in error bodies. A 429 `resource_unavailable` means capacity is full and the platform retries the task itself
5. Pin a version with `WARP_TUI_VERSION` at install, or set `general.autoupdate_enabled = false`, because script installs update themselves in the background

## Questions

### Which is better for AI agents, Cursor CLI or Warp (Warp Agent CLI and the Oz Agent API)?

Warp (Warp Agent CLI and the Oz Agent API) scores 59.8 (C) on agent readiness against Cursor CLI's 35.3 (F), and leads in 6 of 7 scored categories. Cursor CLI leads on payments & pricing.

### Are Cursor CLI and Warp (Warp Agent CLI and the Oz Agent API) open source?

No open-source release is listed for Cursor CLI. Warp (Warp Agent CLI and the Oz Agent API) is open source (Mixed. The client, including the `warp` and `oz` binaries, is AGPL-3.0 with the `warpui_core` and `warpui` crates under MIT. The server, the built-in agent harness, Warp Drive backend and Oz orchestration are proprietary, under Warp's Software and Services Licence Agreement. The SDKs are Apache-2.0).


## For agents

- This comparison as JSON: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/cursor-cli-vs-warp.json, and with the fewest tokens: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/cursor-cli-vs-warp.min.md
- Over MCP at https://www.anchorterminal.com/mcp (no key): `compare_tools {"a": "cursor-cli", "b": "warp"}`. From a terminal: `anchor compare cursor-cli warp`
- Each listing in full: https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/cursor-cli.json and https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/warp.json

## Other comparisons with Cursor CLI or Warp (Warp Agent CLI and the Oz Agent API)

- [Agent Zero vs Cursor CLI](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/agent-zero-vs-cursor-cli.md)
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