Cline is an open-source coding agent that works across the IDE, terminal, and CI. It reads project structure, makes coordinated edits across multiple files, and monitors linter and compiler errors as it works — fixing issues like missing imports, type mismatches, and syntax errors. Edits appear as reviewable diffs tracked with checkpoints so changes can be undone. It also runs shell commands directly, watching output in real time and reacting to build errors, test failures, and server crashes.
A Plan/Act toggle separates exploration and strategy from execution; every file edit and terminal command can require approval, or auto-approve can let it run autonomously. Project-specific behavior is defined in .clinerules files (coding standards, architecture conventions, deployment and testing procedures), picked up automatically across surfaces, with skills to load specific rules on demand.
It ships as several surfaces built on a shared engine: a CLI (interactive or headless for CI/CD scripting), a VS Code extension, a JetBrains plugin, a web-based Kanban board for running many agents in parallel (each card gets its own worktree and auto-commit), and a Node.js SDK for building custom agents. It is model-agnostic, supporting Anthropic, OpenAI, Google, OpenRouter, Bedrock, local models via Ollama/LM Studio, and any OpenAI-compatible endpoint.
Additional capabilities include MCP server integration, a plugin system for registering custom tools and lifecycle hooks, multi-agent teams with a coordinator delegating to specialists, scheduled agents on cron, and connectors to messaging platforms like Slack, Telegram, and Discord.