Google Opens Gemini Code Assist AI Programmer Assistant to Everyone — Free and Almost Unlimited

Last year, Google announced Gemini Code Assist, an AI-powered system designed to help you write code. Now, the tech giant has announced the release of a public preview of the AI ​​assistant, which is available for free to individual programmers, including students, individual developers, freelancers, and startups.

Image source: Google

«Now, anyone can conveniently explore, create code snippets, debug, and modify existing applications — all without having to switch between different windows for help or copy and paste information from different sources. While other popular free coding assistants have limited usage, typically no more than 2,000 code additions per month, we wanted to offer something more generous,” a Google representative commented on the issue.

This likely refers to Gemini Code Assist’s direct competitor, GitHub Copilot, which lets you perform up to 2,000 code completions per month for free, as well as send up to 50 requests to the AI ​​assistant via chat. Google, meanwhile, offers up to 180,000 code completions per month, which the company says is “so high a ceiling that even the most dedicated professional developers will struggle to exceed.”

Like the enterprise version, Gemini Code Assist for individuals is built on the Gemini 2.0 AI model. The algorithm can generate entire blocks of code, complete lines of code as you write them, and provide general coding assistance through a chatbot interface. Gemini Code Assist can be used in Visual Studio Code, GitHub, and JetBrains development environments, and it supports all open-source programming languages.

Developers can instruct Gemini Code Assist using natural language commands. For example, you can ask the AI ​​assistant to generate a “simple HTML form with fields for name, email, and message, and add a submit button.” The system currently supports 38 languages ​​and can handle up to 128,000 tokens in requests via a chat window.

While the free version of Gemini Code Assist can be quite useful, it lacks all the advanced features of the business-focused advanced algorithm. For example, if a user wants performance metrics, integration with Google cloud services like BigQuery, or customization of responses using private sources of code data, then a paid subscription is required.