Augment Code vs Zed
An agentic coding platform priced flat rather than per seat -- up to 50 users on a single subscription. A high-performance native code editor written in Rust, with AI built in and the option to bring your own API keys instead of paying for inference.
At a glance
| Augment Code | Zed | |
|---|---|---|
| Entry price | $20/mo | $10/mo |
| Free tier | No | Yes |
| Plans offered | 3 | 3 |
| Team pricing | $100/mo | $30/seat/mo |
| Vendor | Augment Code | Zed Industries |
| Best for | Small and mid-sized teams, where flat pricing is dramatically cheaper than per-seat | Developers who already hold API keys and would rather pay providers directly |
| Main trade-off | The included usage is a dollar budget, not unlimited -- $20/month of LLM and compute goes quickly across a real team, and top-ups are extra | A much smaller extension ecosystem than VS Code or its forks |
The short answer
Choose Augment Code if small and mid-sized teams, where flat pricing is dramatically cheaper than per-seat. Choose Zed if developers who already hold api keys and would rather pay providers directly. The rest of this page is the detail behind that.
Pricing
Augment Code
| Plan | Price | What it adds |
|---|---|---|
| Standard | $20/mo | Flat, not per seat · Up to 50 seats · $20 of LLM, context and compute usage · CLI and MCP support · SOC 2 Type II · 50 concurrent sessions |
| Business | $100/mo | Flat, not per seat · Up to 50 seats · $100 of included usage |
| Enterprise | Custom | Unlimited users · Multi-region compute · CMEK, ISO 42001 · SSO/OIDC/SCIM |
Pricing verified
Zed
| Plan | Price | What it adds |
|---|---|---|
| Personal | Free | Free forever · 2,000 accepted edit predictions · Unlimited use with your own API keys or external agents |
| Pro | $10/mo | Unlimited edit predictions · $5 monthly token credits, then usage-based · Free trial |
| Business | $30/seat/mo | Org-wide model policies · Data governance · Unified spend visibility · Role-based access |
Pricing verified
Augment Code
Strengths
- Flat pricing for up to 50 seats is genuinely unusual -- a ten-person team pays $20/month total, where a per-seat competitor at $39 would charge $390
- No training on your data on every tier, including the cheapest
- SOC 2 Type II at the $20 entry point rather than reserved for enterprise
- Codebase context engine plus CLI and MCP tooling
Trade-offs
- The included usage is a dollar budget, not unlimited -- $20/month of LLM and compute goes quickly across a real team, and top-ups are extra
- No free plan
- Less established than Copilot or Cursor, with a smaller community to lean on
- Standard and Business differ only in included usage, so the tier choice is purely a spend decision
Augment Code: who it suits
Buy it if
- Small and mid-sized teams, where flat pricing is dramatically cheaper than per-seat
- Organisations needing SOC 2 and no-training guarantees without enterprise pricing
- Teams wanting agentic workflows in both editor and terminal
Skip it if
- Individual developers -- the flat-rate advantage only exists across a team, and $20 buys less usage than a per-seat plan gives one person
- Heavy users, since the included budget is consumed quickly and top-ups then apply
- Anyone who needs a free tier to evaluate
Visit Augment Codefrom $20/mo
Zed
Strengths
- The free tier allows unlimited AI use with your own API keys, so you can pay inference cost directly instead of a subscription margin -- almost nothing else in this category permits that
- Genuinely fast: a native Rust editor rather than an Electron app, and the difference is noticeable on large files
- Works with external agents including Claude Agent and Codex CLI
- Cheapest paid tier in the category at $10, matching Copilot Pro
Trade-offs
- A much smaller extension ecosystem than VS Code or its forks
- Bringing your own keys means managing and paying for API usage yourself, which is not simpler, only cheaper at volume
- Pro includes only $5 of token credits before usage billing starts
- Younger and less proven than the incumbents
Zed: who it suits
Buy it if
- Developers who already hold API keys and would rather pay providers directly
- Anyone who cares about editor performance on large codebases
- People wanting a genuinely free AI-capable editor
Skip it if
- Teams dependent on a wide VS Code extension ecosystem, which does not transfer
- Anyone who wants inference bundled and billing handled for them -- the bring-your-own-key advantage is only an advantage if you want to manage keys
- Organisations needing a long track record before adopting an editor
Visit Zedfrom $10/mo · free tier available
Common questions
- Is Augment Code or Zed cheaper?
- Augment Code starts at $20/mo and Zed at $10/mo. Zed is cheaper at entry level, though the allowances differ.
- Who should not use Augment Code?
- Individual developers -- the flat-rate advantage only exists across a team, and $20 buys less usage than a per-seat plan gives one person. Heavy users, since the included budget is consumed quickly and top-ups then apply. Anyone who needs a free tier to evaluate.
- Who should not use Zed?
- Teams dependent on a wide VS Code extension ecosystem, which does not transfer. Anyone who wants inference bundled and billing handled for them -- the bring-your-own-key advantage is only an advantage if you want to manage keys. Organisations needing a long track record before adopting an editor.
- Does Augment Code or Zed have a free tier?
- Zed has a free tier; Augment Code does not.