Developer Milan Gao released Modo, an open‑source AI‑powered IDE that treats prompts as structured plans before generating code. Forked from the Void editor—a VS Code derivative—Modo reaches roughly 60‑70 % of feature parity with commercial tools like Kiro, Cursor, and Windsurf after a brief development sprint. The project ships under an MIT License, inviting community contributions.

Modo adds a spec‑driven workflow where a prompt spawns a requirements markdown, a design document, and a task checklist stored under .modo/specs. Inline CodeLens buttons let users run individual tasks or all pending items, updating status symbols as the AI progresses. Steering files enforce project rules—such as TypeScript strict mode—and agent hooks automate linting on file saves.

Built atop Void’s multi‑provider LLM support, autocomplete, and tool‑calling engine, Modo bundles powers for TypeScript, React, testing, API design, and Docker, activated via slash commands. A dark “Modo Dark” theme and a playful avatar personalize the experience. By exposing the full requirements‑to‑code pipeline, the IDE gives developers granular control while keeping the convenience of AI assistance.

Installation requires Node 20; cloning the repo, running npm install, and launching the provided script sets up a fully functional workspace with .modo directories for specs, steering, hooks, and settings. Early adopters can connect to any supported model provider—Gemini’s free tier offers the quickest start. Modo’s open architecture positions it as a viable community alternative to proprietary AI coding assistants.