JetBrains AI

What is JetBrains AI?

JetBrains AI is the umbrella name for the AI features the company has built into its IDEs, and the centerpiece is the AI Assistant. JetBrains has been making developer tools since 2000, with IntelliJ IDEA as the flagship, and it chose to weave AI into those existing tools rather than ship a separate editor. The result is an assistant that already understands your project, your frameworks and your IDE's deep analysis.

The assistant can complete code, explain errors, generate tests and documentation, write commit messages, and chat about your code with full project context. It also integrates with JetBrains' own AI services and lets you bring your own model or API keys in some configurations, which appeals to teams with preferences or compliance needs.

JetBrains AI launched in 2023 and has since been rolled out across the whole IDE family, from IntelliJ IDEA and PyCharm to WebStorm, GoLand, PhpStorm, Rider and CLion. It is available as a standalone subscription or bundled with the higher All Products Pack tiers.

Key Features

• AI chat with project-aware context inside any JetBrains IDE
• Code completion tuned to the IDE's language analysis
• Test generation, documentation generation and code explanations
• Commit message generation from your diffs
• Refactoring suggestions grounded in the IDE's own engine
• Bring your own model and API key options
• Works across the entire JetBrains IDE lineup

How to get started

Make sure your JetBrains IDE is up to date, then install or enable the AI Assistant plugin from the marketplace. Sign in with a JetBrains account that has an AI subscription, or configure your own API key if your plan supports it. Once active, the AI tool window opens with chat, and inline actions appear in the editor context menu for explanations, tests and commit messages.

• Update your JetBrains IDE to the latest version
• Install the AI Assistant plugin
• Sign in with an AI-enabled JetBrains account
• Open the AI tool window and ask about your project
• Try test generation and commit message generation

Use cases

• AI-assisted coding in Java, Kotlin, Python, Go, PHP and more
• Generating unit tests for existing code
• Explaining compiler errors and suggesting fixes
• Writing meaningful commit messages automatically
• Team adoption, since AI lives inside the IDEs teams already use
• Enterprise setups with bring-your-own-model requirements

Pricing and licensing

JetBrains AI is proprietary and sits on top of the IDE licensing model. The AI Assistant is available through standalone AI subscriptions, AI Pro and AI Ultimate, which differ in included models, features and usage limits, and it is also bundled with some All Products Pack plans. The IDEs themselves remain separate purchases with their own subscription or perpetual options.

Pricing details and model lineups change as JetBrains iterates on the product, and there are different options for individuals, organizations and enterprises. Check the official JetBrains AI page for current prices and what each tier includes.

Pros and cons

JetBrains AI's advantage is depth: it inherits the IDE's outstanding language analysis, refactoring and debugging, so AI suggestions arrive with far more context than in a plain editor. For teams already on JetBrains, the assistant is a natural extension of the workflow, and the bring-your-own-model option is rare among AI assistants.

The trade-offs are cost and scope. You pay for the IDE and for the AI subscription, which makes it pricier than free editors with AI extensions, and the assistant focuses on JetBrains IDEs only, so it does not help with editors outside the family.

Alternatives

• GitHub Copilot: works across VS Code, JetBrains IDEs and more
• Cursor: AI-first editor with codebase-wide agent features
• Claude Code: terminal agent usable from any editor
• Continue: open-source assistant for VS Code and JetBrains
• Tabnine: privacy-focused completion for enterprises