Comparison · facts verified 2026-09-17

Orbi vs Cursor Background Agents

Cursor hands off a merge-ready PR; Orbi owns the delivery line through the reviewed merge. Cursor Background Agents, now called Cloud Agents, run tasks from editor, web, or Slack prompts and hand changes back through a repository branch and pull request. Orbi starts with a GitHub Issue labeled ai-ready.

Read Cursor docs ↗All comparisons Sources & dates →

THE COMPETITOR, FROM ITS OWN MATERIALS

What Cursor documents

Cursor’s Cloud Agents documentation describes prompts from the editor, web, and Slack, with agents working on a separate branch and pushing changes back to the repository. Its stated handoff is a merge-ready pull request with artifacts to demo the changes. The cited page does not document who approves, merges, or publishes a release.

“open pull requests in the repos it changes”

“produce merge-ready PRs with artifacts to demo their changes”

“work on a separate branch, then push changes to your repo for handoff”

Source: Cursor — Cloud Agent (also Markdown) — verified 2026-09-17.

THE DELIVERY BOUNDARY

A PR handoff or a delivery line

Dimension	Orbi	Cursor Cloud Agents
Task entry	GitHub Issue + `ai-ready`	Prompt from the editor, web, or Slack
Where it runs	Your machine and Git worktree	Cursor cloud
Who reviews	Independent review repairs code and reruns tests	Not documented
Who merges	Runner merges the exact reviewed head	Not documented
Who publishes the release	Runner tags and publishes a GitHub Release	Not documented
Where state lives	GitHub Issues, labels, branches, PRs	Repository branch and pull request; agent handoff artifacts
Self-host	Yes	Not documented; the cited product is cloud-hosted
BYOK	Yes, any endpoint	Not documented
License	AGPL-3.0 or Sustainable Use License	Not documented

Sources: Cursor Cloud Agent documentation; Orbi documentation — verified 2026-09-17.

AN HONEST READ

Which one fits the job?

CHOOSE CURSOR IF

You want a cloud agent that hands back a merge-ready PR

Prompting from your editor, web app, or Slack is the right task entry
You want the agent to work on a separate branch
A merge-ready PR and demo artifacts are the handoff you need
You will own any approval, merge, and release steps not documented in the cited flow

Visit Cursor docs ↗

CHOOSE ORBI IF

You want GitHub to carry the delivery ledger

An ai-ready Issue is the task entry
Independent review can repair code and rerun tests
The runner owns the reviewed merge and tagged Release path
You want self-hosting and BYOK on a GitHub-native operating surface

Self-host Orbi ↗

PROVENANCE

Sources and verification dates

This page is a dated snapshot. Revisit the linked official materials before making a decision.

Cursor — Cloud Agent — task entry, branches, pull requests, merge-ready handoff, and artifactsverified 2026-09-17
Cursor — Cloud Agent Markdown — accessible copy of the official pageverified 2026-09-17
Cursor 2.0 changelog — Background Agents renamed to Cloud Agentsverified 2026-10-04
Orbi documentation — GitHub-native task and delivery workflowverified 2026-09-17

OPEN SOURCE (AGPL-3.0) CORE

A merge-ready PR is a handoff, not a release

Cursor documents a cloud agent that returns a merge-ready PR with demo artifacts. Orbi keeps the Issue, review, merge, and release in one delivery line.

Install Orbi ↗All comparisons

Is your Issue ai-ready? The 12 factors