VSCode + Cline + Continue: Never Pay for Cursor Again
Author / channel: Nathan Sebhastian Format: video Source: Original Published: 2025-04-09
Summary
End-to-end setup tutorial: install VS Code, install ollama, install continue and cline extensions, configure Continue with deepseek-r1:7b (chat) and qwen2.5-coder:1.5b (autocomplete), let Cline use its trial credits then point it at openrouter free DeepSeek 671B / 685B for ongoing free use. Demonstrates the canonical “cursor replacement” stack: Continue handles autocomplete and inline edit, Cline handles multi-file agentic generation. Builds a Flappy Bird clone end-to-end with Cline as the proof.
Key Points
- The two-extension thesis — Cursor’s features split cleanly across Continue (inline / autocomplete / Cmd+K) and Cline (multi-file agentic, terminal commands, file creation). Together they cover what Cursor does. Free, open-source, local.
- Continue model assignment — chat:
deepseek-r1:7b(free, decent at code Q&A); autocomplete:qwen2.5-coder:1.5b(small is fine for completion — larger models don’t help here per the video). - Continue config.yaml — manual model entries with
name,provider,model, plusroles: [autocomplete]for the Qwen entry. - Cline trial → OpenRouter fallback — Cline ships with free trial credits; once exhausted, switch provider to OpenRouter, paste API key, pick
deepseek-r1(671B) ordeepseek-v3.2.4(685B). Free models = rate limited / occasional timeouts. - Multi-file editing distinction — Continue is single-file scoped (it’ll just answer about a Flappy Bird game request rather than create files). Cline understands the workspace and creates the files. This is the actual reason both are needed.
- Privacy advantage over Cursor — full local control, no privacy-mode toggle to remember, no third-party training on your code.
Connected Pages
- cline — agent extension
- continue — autocomplete extension
- ollama — local model runtime
- openrouter — fallback API gateway
- deepseek, qwen — local models used
- Nathan Sebhastian — channel hub