Comparing IDEs: Cursor vs Cline, Finally

I've put this off for way too long. Time to actually test whether Cursor is cheaper than Cline.

I finally installed it, and immediately the trust issues started.

The data sharing prompt - can't move forward without accepting. Fair enough, you can disable it afterward, right? Wrong. When you go to turn it off, there's a 24-hour delay. They built this knowing that most people won't bother disabling something that's already enabled. It's dark pattern design, and it bothers me more than the feature itself.

Cloud code indexing - all my code analysis is apparently sitting in their cloud somewhere. Also disableable, but again, opt-out instead of opt-in.

The pricing mystery - and this is the big one. I've done the math on Cline, where I can see actual token costs for each request. Cursor's per-prompt pricing seems suspiciously cheap compared to the raw model costs. Either they're burning VC money to capture market share, or there's something in the contract I'm not seeing.

For me, the transparency matters more than saving 10%. If I can't trust the pricing or understand what's happening with my code, the cheaper option isn't actually cheaper - it's just debt I don't understand yet.

I'm going to sit with Cursor for another week, do some deeper testing, and see if I can figure out the actual economics. But honestly? My first instinct is that a developer-friendly tool wouldn't require 24-hour delays to respect your privacy settings.

Some friction is just friction. Some friction is a warning sign.

I'll report back.