Kode: The Verification-First AI Coding Agent

Kode is the AI coding agent that never writes code without verifying it first. Every patch passes a 6-gate pipeline before touching your filesystem.

Kode is a verification-first AI coding agent. Unlike other AI code tools that generate and hope for the best, Kode runs every LLM-generated patch through a deterministic Go verification pipeline — catching syntax errors, hallucinated imports, broken function calls, and security vulnerabilities in under 50ms — before anything reaches your disk.

Quickstart

Install Kode and run your first task in under five minutes.

Installation

Install via shell script, NPM, or build from source.

CLI Reference

Full reference for every Kode command and flag.

Configuration

Customize models, budgets, blast radius limits, and more.

How Kode works

Kode enforces a strict Plan → Generate → Verify → Apply → Test workflow. You describe a task; Kode builds a surgical context graph from your codebase, generates code, verifies it through six gates, applies only what passes, and runs your tests. If tests fail, it rolls back automatically.

1. Install Kode

   Install Kode with a single command on macOS, Linux, or Windows. See the installation guide.

2. Initialize your project

   Run kode init in your project root to scaffold a .kode/kode.json config file with sensible defaults.

3. Run your first task

   Use kode run "your task description" to generate, verify, and apply code in one step.

4. Explore advanced modes

   Use Ghost Branches for parallel strategies, TDD Mode for test-first discipline, or Daemon Mode for continuous background analysis.

Key features

6-Gate Verification

Syntax, imports, function calls, blast radius, architecture, and security — all checked before writes.

Ghost Branches

Spawn parallel git worktrees with competing strategies. The winner is merged automatically.

Blindfold Mode

SHA-256 obfuscate identifiers before sending to any LLM for maximum code privacy.

TDD Mode

Block production file writes until a corresponding test file exists.

Loop Mode

Full end-to-end pipeline with automatic rollback on test failure.

MCP Integration

Expose Kode’s verification engine to Claude Desktop and other MCP-compatible agents.