AI Coding Tools Compared: ChatGPT, Claude, Copilot, Cursor, Lovable and AI Agents
We compare AI coding tools by asking each to help build the same small app, Snake in React. We compare the tools rather than ship one polished build. The walkthrough follows the tool categories, moving from chat applications to coding assistants and IDEs, then to project bootstrappers and agents. Links The main resources: Lovable Snake preview AI Dev Tools Zoomcamp AI Engineering Buildcamp RAG agents workshop LLM Zoomcamp The comparison The same app appears in several workflows: flowchart LR PROMPT["Prompt<br/>implement snake in react"] CHAT["Chat apps<br/>ChatGPT, Claude, DeepSeek, Ernie, Microsoft Copilot"] IDE["Coding assistants and IDEs<br/>Claude Code, GitHub Copilot, Cursor, Pear"] BOOT["Project bootstrappers<br/>Bolt, Lovable"] AGENTS["Agents<br/>tools, file access, computer use"] CHATAPP["Local app<br/>snake-chatgpt"] CLAUDEAPP["Local app<br/>snake-claude-code"] PREVIEW["Hosted app<br/>Lovable preview"] PROMPT --> CHAT CHAT --> CHATAPP IDE --> CLAUDEAPP BOOT --> PREVIEW AGENTS --> IDE AGENTS --> BOOT We build two Vite React projects. snake-chatgpt keeps the game in one component, so it shows what a chat app can produce from a short prompt. snake-claude-code splits the page shell from the game component. It adds a score and a start-and-restart flow, plus WASD controls and a walls-versus-pass-through mode.