We launched the Agent Client Protocol (ACP) because we wanted more agents in Zed. Rather than integrating each one individually, we built a protocol that any agent could implement. We also hoped it would help the broader ecosystem: agents could stay focused on logic while editors handled UX, giving developers real choice instead of being locked into specific tool combinations.
At the time, though, it felt like a leap of faith. Would anyone actually adopt it? Would other editors see the same benefit we did?
The response has been encouraging. Immediately, developers across different ecosystems started implementing ACP support.
What began as a collaboration with Google to bring Gemini CLI into Zed has quickly grown into something bigger: a real p…
We launched the Agent Client Protocol (ACP) because we wanted more agents in Zed. Rather than integrating each one individually, we built a protocol that any agent could implement. We also hoped it would help the broader ecosystem: agents could stay focused on logic while editors handled UX, giving developers real choice instead of being locked into specific tool combinations.
At the time, though, it felt like a leap of faith. Would anyone actually adopt it? Would other editors see the same benefit we did?
The response has been encouraging. Immediately, developers across different ecosystems started implementing ACP support.
What began as a collaboration with Google to bring Gemini CLI into Zed has quickly grown into something bigger: a real protocol with real adoption on both the client and agent side.
Here’s what’s been built so far and what the community is working on.
Clients: Bringing ACP to Different Editors
ACP support has expanded beyond Zed. Several editor communities have built their own implementations, proving the protocol can work across different environments.
Available Now
Neovim: Two plugins now support ACP. CodeCompanion and yetone/avante.nvim. Both let Neovim users connect to ACP-compatible agents directly in their workflow.
Emacs: The agent-shell plugin brings agents to Emacs users through a native Emacs shell to interact with LLM agents powered by ACP.
marimo notebook: ACP made its way into marimo’s Python notebook environment, showing the protocol’s promise beyond traditional code editors.
In Progress
Eclipse: There’s a prototype of ACP/MCP support for the Eclipse IDE.
Toad: The universal interface for agentic coding in the terminal is implementing ACP support.
Agents: More Options for Developers
We’re still working on adding agents to Zed through ACP and we hope to see more agents join the ecosystem. Here’s what is out there today.
Available Now
Gemini CLI: As our original launch partner, the integration serves as a reference implementation and shows what’s possible when agents and editors work together cleanly.
Claude Code: Available through Zed’s SDK adapter. We built this to demonstrate how existing agent APIs can be adapted to work with ACP-compatible editors. And because a lot of you were asking for it!
Goose: Square’s open-source agent joined the ecosystem by implementing ACP. It’s now available to any ACP client.
In Progress
Codex: We’re working on an adapter for OpenAI’s Codex to bring it into the ACP ecosystem. We’re taking a similar approach to how we integrated Claude Code. There’s also a community version out in the world already.
Aider: An Aider implementation of ACP is underway.
Cursor: There’s apparently a Cursor ACP adapter and some amount of interest in the Cursor community. Having Cursor’s Agent in Zed would be pretty cool so help us advocate for that if you agree.
If You Want to be Involved
ACP is clearly working, but there’s always more to build. And we welcome your help if you’re interested.
We’d love to see more agent implementations, whether that’s building adapters for other popular agents, wrapping existing APIs, or building new agents from scratch using ACP. We also welcome more clients and are happy to chat with anyone who’s looking at adopting ACP.
We’re also looking for feedback on the protocol itself. We’re learning as we go, so input on the protocol is extremely helpful: what works, what doesn’t, and what’s missing. Find us in Discord, or open a discussion.
What’s Next for ACP
We have some bigger ACP partnerships in the works that we’re not quite ready to share, but the momentum is accelerating. We’re excited about what we’ve seen so far from the community, and we can’t wait to share more about what’s next for ACP when we can.
With the increasing adoption of ACP, we are also focused on giving users greater control over the ACP agents configured in Zed. We’re still discussing this internally, but we’re leaning towards a method for selecting and configuring different agents, much like how MCP servers are shown in the user interface today. More to come on that too!
If we missed your ACP implementation, please reach out ([email protected]) so we can add you and keep this list updated.
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