Codex CLI is open source and Claude Code is not, so the question is whether you want source access and the option to fork, or would rather have a vendor accountable for it.
Anthropic's coding agent — terminal, IDE and SDK, with hooks, skills and MCP built in.
Configure via .claude/settings.json; drop reusable procedures in .claude/skills/.
OpenAI's terminal coding agent.
| Claude Code | Codex CLI | |
|---|---|---|
| Licence | Proprietary | Open source |
| Pricing | paid | paid |
| Self-hostable | No | No |
| Languages | Any language | Any language |
| Install | npm install -g @anthropic-ai/claude-code | npm install -g @openai/codex |
| Keys required | ANTHROPIC_API_KEY | OPENAI_API_KEY |
Codex CLI is open source and Claude Code is not, so the question is whether you want source access and the option to fork, or would rather have a vendor accountable for it. Claude Code: Anthropic's coding agent — terminal, IDE and SDK, with hooks, skills and MCP built in. Codex CLI: OpenAI's terminal coding agent.
Claude Code is a hosted service only. Codex CLI is a hosted service only.
Claude Code is proprietary (paid). Codex CLI is open source (paid).
Every page here answers to Accept: text/markdown and returns the same content at roughly a tenth the tokens. No separate site, no toggle — same URL.
curl -s -H "Accept: text/markdown" https://newagent.build/compare/claude-code-vs-codex-cli