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Cursor 1.4: Agent Steerability, Tool Improvements & Usage Visibility

Cursor 1.4 brings smarter Agent steerability, overhauled tools for large codebases, GitHub PR support, and usage visibility. Background Agents now start 2x faster.

TL;DR

Agent steerability improved — messages now queue/interrupt at optimal times instead of waiting for generation to finish
Agent tools overhauled for large codebases — better file reading, directory exploration, search ranking, and token efficiency
Usage stats now visible in Chat; Background Agents 2x faster to start and work in GitHub PRs

New

Better Agent message handling — ⌥+Enter queues messages at the next tool call; ⌘+Enter interrupts immediately. Default behavior configurable in Settings.
Improved Agent tools — Read file removes 2MB cap and reads full files when appropriate. List explores full directory trees with metadata. Grep has less noise. Codebase Search ranks better. Web Search uses lightweight native model for smaller, more relevant results.
Per-Agent model selection — Assign different models to each Agent in separate tabs; forking preserves the selected model.
Usage visibility in Chat — See all-time usage or when you exceed 50% of plan quota. Team and Enterprise users get access in September.
Compact chat mode — Hides tool icons, collapses diffs by default, auto-hides input when idle for long sessions.
GitHub support for Background Agents — Tag @Cursor in pull requests; Agent reads prompt, applies fix, pushes commit, and updates status with comments and todos.
Agent sidebar — Inspect and manage all Agents (foreground and background) from left sidebar. Peek into remote machines to watch Background Agent work.
2x faster Background Agent startup — Significant performance improvement for remote execution.

Enterprise

AI code tracking API — Get commit-level visibility into AI usage and accepted changes across your team.
Admin API for blocklists — Block specific files or directories from being indexed or used in context.
Member exports — Export all workspace members to CSV from the dashboard.