Blackbox AIThe high-trust platform for frontier inference
vs
ZedThe world's fastest IDE. Open source. AI optional.
Comparison · AI Coding Assistants · weekly run Nov 3
Blackbox AI vs Zed
Which one do AI engines recommend, and how do they differ on price, fit and features?
The short answer
Zed is the stronger AI pick in AI Coding Assistants: it has a visibility score of 1 versus 0.6 for Blackbox AI.
Choose Blackbox AI if…
- Usage-based pricing suits your budget better than per seat
- Real-time code search and rapid code assembly tools
Choose Zed if…
- You want the brand AI engines rank higher (1 vs 0.6)
- You want a free plan to start
- Per seat pricing suits your budget better than usage-based
- Ideal for small teams already on GitHub
AI visibility side by side
Latest weekly run · Nov 3
| Metric | Blackbox AI | Zed |
|---|---|---|
| Visibility score | 0.6% | 1% |
| Change vs last week | New | New |
| Rank in AI Coding Assistants | #32 | #26 |
| Share of voice | 0.4% | 0.4% |
| Mentions this run | 2 | 2 |
| Positive in AI answers | — | 50% |
The stronger value in each row is marked with a ✓.
Visibility score trend
Weekly runs over the last 60 days
Blackbox AI 0pp · Zed 0pp over 0 weekly runs.
Engine by engine
Zed leads on 2 of 3 engines
ChatGPT
AI Mode
Perplexity
Blackbox AIZed
Head to head in AI answers
0 engine answers name both brands
0Blackbox AI ranked higher
0Zed ranked higher
Features, pricing & fit
| Dimension | Blackbox AI | Zed |
|---|---|---|
| Pricing model | Usage-based | Per seat |
| Entry price | Contact sales | Free; paid from $10 per seat / mo |
| Free plan | No | Yes |
| Onboarding fee | Included | — |
| Deployment | Cloud API, and dedicated single-tenant deployment on Enterprise | Desktop editor on Windows, macOS and Linux, with remote development over SSH, WSL and dev containers. Users can run local Ollama models, and API keys for hosted providers are kept on the local machine. |
| Support | Forward-deployed engineer on Enterprise, with implementation included at no added cost, Custom SLAs | — |
| Founded | — | 2021 |
| Headquarters | San Francisco, CA | Boulder, Colorado |
| Employees | 11–50 | 11–50 |
| Funding | Series A | Series B · $42M raised |
| Best for | Enterprises and regulated organizations that need dedicated, encrypted inference with zero data retention, and developer teams that want open models behind one endpoint | Developers who want a fast editor with AI optional, and teams that need org-level control over AI features and data sharing through the Business plan. |
Plans side by side
Pros and cons
Themes from the AI answers that mention each brand
Blackbox AI
- Real-time code search and rapid code assembly tools
Zed
- Ideal for small teams already on GitHub
- Works with VS Code and JetBrains
- Heavy usage requires a paid plan upgrade
Data collected ·ChatGPT, Perplexity, Google AI Mode·coverage 100%·next run
Cite as: SlateIndex, “Blackbox AI vs Zed”, https://slateindex.ai/compare/blackbox-ai-vs-zed, data of Nov 3, 2026. Licence: CC BY 4.0.