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GitHub Copilot vs LocalCode

Bottom line

GitHub Copilot has a free plan plus paid upgrades, while LocalCode is free. LocalCode is open source and GitHub Copilot is not. You can run LocalCode on your own machine or server; GitHub Copilot is hosted by the vendor.

Which one should you try?

GitHub Copilot

Freemium

Best for Developers and teams already using GitHub for issues and pull requests

Visit GitHub Copilot See full review

LocalCode

Free

Best for Mac users wanting local AI CLI assistance

Visit LocalCode See full review

Pricing, capabilities and platforms side by side. Prices are as of the "Pricing checked" date in the table.

GitHub Copilot

GitHub Copilot

GitHub's AI coding assistant for IDEs, GitHub.com and the CLI. Free plan; Pro $10/month; Business $19 per seat per month.

LocalCode

LocalCode

Type what you want, get a suggested command, approve it, and it runs — no API key, no network request, no telemetry. All inference runs on Apple Silicon through the Foundation Models framework, which means your file paths, hostnames, and search terms never travel anywhere. The workflow is strictly one-shot: one prompt, one command suggestion, one approval gate. There is no session memory, no chaining, and no multi-step automation. Teams that want anything beyond single-command suggestions will hit the ceiling of what this proof-of-concept was designed to do.

AttributeGitHub CopilotLocalCode
PricingFreemiumFree
PriceFree plan; Pro $10/month; Pro+ $39/month; Business $19/seat/month—
Pricing checkedOct 17, 2026Not checked yet
Free trialNot statedNot stated
Open sourceNoYes
Has APINot statedNo
Self-hosted optionNoYes
PlatformsVS Code, Visual Studio, JetBrains IDEs, Eclipse, Xcode, Neovim, GitHub.com, GitHub Mobile, Windows Terminal, Copilot CLIApple Silicon Mac, macOS 26+
Pros
  • Works across VS Code, Visual Studio, JetBrains IDEs, Eclipse, Xcode, Neovim, GitHub.com and a CLI.
  • Agent tasks can start from an issue and return as a pull request for review.
  • Organizations get admin controls for access, policies, file exclusion and audit logs.
  • All inference runs on-device via Apple Foundation Models, so file paths, hostnames, and search terms never leave the machine — which means no data-handling review before using it on sensitive internal systems.
  • MIT-licensed with Go and Swift source fully available, so any developer can audit exactly what runs and modify the tool without negotiating a license or waiting on a vendor.
  • A mandatory approval step before any command executes, so a misunderstood prompt cannot silently delete files or overwrite output — you review before it runs.
  • No API key, account, or network connection required at runtime, so there is no quota to hit, no credential to rotate, and no outage dependency on a third-party service.
Cons
  • AI credit allowances limit heavier use; organizations pay $0.01 per credit beyond the pool.
  • Copilot Free is capped at 2,000 completions a month with automatic model selection only.
  • Not currently available for GitHub Enterprise Server.
  • The tool has no session memory and no command chaining: each prompt is independent. If you need to run 'find the large files, then compress them, then move them,' you issue three separate prompts and manually carry the output between steps — at which point you are doing the work the tool was supposed to save.
  • The build requires macOS 26 and Xcode 26 alongside Apple Silicon. Teams with Intel Macs, Linux servers, or mixed-OS development environments cannot use it at all — this is the condition under which a team switches to a cloud-based CLI assistant like GitHub Copilot CLI or a self-hosted model with an OpenAI-compatible endpoint, which have no hardware gate.
  • The vendor labels this a proof-of-concept explicitly. There are no open issues, no pull requests, and a commit history of 20 commits. Teams that need a maintained, production-grade tool with bug fixes and evolving model support are adopting technical debt the day they ship this to a shared workflow.

Made up your mind?

GitHub Copilot

Freemium

Best for Developers and teams already using GitHub for issues and pull requests

Visit GitHub Copilot See full review

LocalCode

Free

Best for Mac users wanting local AI CLI assistance

Visit LocalCode See full review

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Specs come from each tool's own site and docs (how we test). AIDiveForge is editorially independent.

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