Codex 2026 Benchmarking: Tops GitHub Copilot & Cursor

Three AI coding tools are dominating discussions among Australian developers: GitHub Copilot, Cursor, and OpenAI Codex. Independent benchmarking in 2026 shows Codex's underlying model is ahead of both rivals on SWE-bench Verified. GitHub Copilot is a plugin, supporting many IDEs like VS Code and JetBrains. It uses a mix of models including GPT-4.1. Cursor is a standalone editor, forked from VS Code, with AI features at its core. It has the highest individual price tag at $200 a month. OpenAI Codex, rebuilt in 2025, is bundled with a ChatGPT subscription. It's a cloud-based coding agent, accessible via CLI, cloud task queue, and IDE extensions. These tools offer different approaches to AI-powered coding. This information helps developers understand their options for improving their coding workflow.