I’ve been using JetBrains IDEs for many years now.

I have never had a real opportunity to use VSCode as an IDE - I was doing quick edits, found it very limited (no git blame, seriously?) and getting back to IntelliJ. I have never transitioned it from being a code editor to an IDE, installed few random plugins and wondered why is this better than having it out of the box.

But recently, because of some problems with IntelliJ WSL connection and then Copilot issues, I gave VSCode a chance… and TBH, I am wondering if IntelliJ is still the best choice for a DevOps engineer.

What do you think?

Disclaimer: everything i write from this point on, is my personal feeling after couple of days of using VSCode as my daily driver: it is not time tested opinion!!!

The features and functionalities I use or care about are (no particular order!):

• git client with git blame, history and more advanced features

  • VSC: yes, plugin (out of the box only very basic functionality)

  • IntelliJ: yes

• Search, replace and refactoring

  • VSC: yes

  • IntelliJ: yes

• Copilot

  • VSC: yes (plugin, better)

  • IntelliJ: yes (plugin)

• Good readability

  • VSC: is ok, but IntelliJ is much better. VSC is highly configurable, but has some stupid defaults (like too small indentation in file explorer)

  • IntelliJ: great

• Kubernetes, GitHub, Gitlab, Terraform, integrations:

  • VSC: yes

  • IntelliJ yes

• Fast startup time

  • VSC: yes

  • IntelliJ: jeez, yesterday I literally opened VSC, modified the file and pushed changes to reconcile the cluster before Jetbrains Gateway managed to connect to my WSL IntelliJ.
    IntelliJ always sucked here, but with additional overhead of Gateway connection it is really painfully slow to start up (T14s, Ryzen 7 Pro, 32GBs RAM).

• Remote development

  • VSC: yes, way more stable experience

  • IntelliJ: yes, but feel like beta way more often as it should

• Ability to open multiple projects in one window

  • VSC: yes, super easy and intuitive

  • IntelliJ: yes, but it is multistep setup that takes time what renders it useless for quick multi-projects edits

• Supporting wide array of languages:

  • VSC: yes, via a plugin

  • IntelliJ: yes (formally via a plugin, but from other Jetbrains IDE). It’s certainly better when using more advanced features like Django support.

• Intelligent autocompletion suggestions

  • VSC: yes, but the quality depends on language and is sometimes poor

  • IntelliJ: yes

• Ability to highlight, lint and parse wide array of files (like nginx conf, ini files etc)

  • VSC: yes, probably via a plugin

  • IntelliJ: yes, probably via a plugin

• Adding desired functions:

  • VSC: yes, and the plugin ecosystem is far bigger

  • IntelliJ: yes

So, basically I believe I can say I need support for everything, but I don’t need very sophisticated support in any of them.

Some time ago when using VSCode i felt like “i understand why it is free” when IntelliJ was a complete, polished package out of the box.

But now, when IntelliJ isn’t that shiny (just look at the tickets, threads like settings sync can be years old and the answer is “we have no plans to support it in remote development usage scenario... (so why tf haven't you removed this option?!)… I am wondering if VSCode shouldn’t be my editor of choice.I still test things like adding proper icons support, miss things like ability to recognize file type by its content (like Kustomize yaml) or fancy stuff like auto-converting curl pasted to .http file, but after a week it is like 90% of what I ever need or want to have.

PS. I have been using Jetbrains IDEs for many years now, so I am probably biased in matters like readability: it’s better for me because I am used things look like in IntelliJ.

PS2. Let’s compare features and not the price - I am perfectly aware IntelliJ is a paid option.

Github announced multi-model support (Claude, Gemini), as well as multi-file editing for VS Code. Are these features coming to JetBrains IDEs anytime soon as well?

In my opinion, JetBrains was a bit lacking in the way they approach AI in their IDEs. This would be a great chance to once again come on top with top-tier DX and use the models that work rather than trying to come up with their own AI model. Take what works in Cursor and make it better (seems like VS Code already did) :)

I don't get what I'm doing wrong. Many people are hyping Github Copilot for Coding and see their jobs endangered. I've been trying it now for weeks in Agent mode and model GPT-4.1 and I'm underwhelmed. Maybe it's because I'm using IntelliJ. I can't do simple refactorings, if it concerns more than one class. To check for errors it generates the wrong gradle commands. I usually need 5-10 iterations just that it fixes the compile errors and sometimes it does crazy stuff which is not usuable, like refactoring the wrong shared component.
I asked it to split street into streetName and houseNumber in the main model. I also asked it to change the requests and responses on REST layer. It ignored the latter ond screwed up the first one.
What's your experience so far?

I have a student plan for GitHub. I can access the GitHub copilot plugin for IntelliJ. I was wondering whether JetBrains' AI Assistant is better or comparable?

Hey guys,

we recently started evaluating different AI tools to boost productivity within our company.

The pick was Github Copilot and I got a pro license to try it out. I have to say, it was horrlible.

Sometimes it forgot the topic of the conversation. When asked a follow up question to an answer, it replied as if it was a new chat (In ask mode).

When I appended files to the chat, it suggested changes and after I applied them and prompted based on them, it didn't notice that the files were changed and suggested another approach to the problem that was now solved.

I switched it to agent mode and gave it a simple task that I know a coding agent is able to solve (create a couple of enums based on data I provide). I defined the package where the Enums should be created.

The first thing it did is to ask me for permission to create the folder structure based on the reference in a folder that is outside of the project sources, even though I appended an example file that was in the same package.

To see if i might be expecting too much, I gave that exact prompt to Junie and it did it without any issues.

Overall it felt like when you want to get a child to do something but in the end just end up doing it yourself.

I still give it the benefit of the doubt that I might be missing something, I just can't believe it is that bad.

TL;DR

My experience was absolutely terrible, context awareness of it is nealry non-existent, it doesn't even get the location right even though I appended a file from that folder.

I am wondering, those of you who tried it or use it, what is your experience with it?