Friday, January 16, 2026

Google Antigravity: AI-First Growth with This New IDE


Google Antigravity: AI-First Growth with This New IDE
Picture by Editor

 

Introduction

 
For the final couple of years, the substitute intelligence (AI) revolution in coding felt like having a really quick junior developer sitting subsequent to you. Instruments like GitHub Copilot or Cursor have been superb at ending your sentences, however you have been nonetheless the one holding the steering wheel for each single flip. You needed to copy-paste snippets, repair the imports, and manually run the exams to see if the AI truly knew what it was speaking about.

We’re formally shifting previous that. Google Antigravity marks the start of the “agent-first” period. It is not only a Copilot; it’s a platform the place you cease being the typist and begin being the architect. Google selected the identify “Antigravity” for a really particular motive. In conventional growth, there’s a large quantity of “gravity” — the heavy, tedious weight of organising environments, debugging boilerplate, and leaping between the terminal, browser, and editor. Antigravity is constructed to supply liftoff. It’s designed to drag you out of the weeds of low-level syntax and elevate you to a better, task-oriented stage.

As an alternative of writing code line-by-line, you present the imaginative and prescient. The built-in growth atmosphere (IDE) autonomous brokers deal with the development, the testing, and the verification.

 

Google Antigravity Landing PageGoogle Antigravity Landing Page
The Google Antigravity touchdown web page | Picture by Creator

 

The story of Antigravity is definitely a narrative of Google going again to its roots. On November 18, 2025, Google unveiled Antigravity alongside the launch of their Gemini 3 mannequin household. One of the crucial shocking elements of the Antigravity launch was the return of Google co-founder Sergey Brin. After years away from each day operations, Brin reportedly went into “Founder Mode,” working late nights alongside engineers to refine the agentic capabilities of the IDE. His purpose was to maneuver Google from “Search” to “Motion,” and Antigravity is the first instrument for that mission.

Antigravity did not seem out of skinny air. A lot of its DNA comes from a startup referred to as Windsurf. Google realized that the Windsurf staff had cracked the code on how AI brokers ought to work together with an IDE, in order that they acquired the staff in a large $2.4 billion deal to steer the event of what we now know as Antigravity.

Why didn’t Google simply add these options to an present instrument? As a result of conventional IDEs — like Visible Studio Code (VS Code) — have been constructed for people to sort in. They assume a human is the first actor. Antigravity is rebuilt from the bottom up, assuming an AI agent is the first employee. It’s a workspace designed for “vibe coding,” the place the velocity of your concepts is the one factor that issues, not the velocity of your typing.

 

Getting Began with Antigravity

 
Earlier than you can begin orchestrating brokers, that you must get the software program onto your machine. As a result of Antigravity is constructed on a fork of VS Code, the set up course of feels acquainted; nonetheless, there are just a few system-specific concerns to remember to make sure the AI brokers have enough assets to run easily.

 

// System Necessities

Antigravity is not a light-weight textual content editor; it is working native fashions and browser-based brokers. Here’s what you want:

  • macOS: You want Monterey (model 12) or later. Whereas Intel Macs are supported, the expertise is optimized for Apple Silicon (M1/M2/M3/M4), as native AI inference depends closely on the unified reminiscence structure
  • Home windows: You want a 64-bit model of Home windows 10 or 11. It’s extremely really useful to put in the IDE in your major system drive (often the C: drive) to keep away from any permissions points when the AI agent tries to execute terminal instructions
  • Linux: It helps most trendy distributions like Ubuntu (20.04+), Debian (10+), and Fedora (36+). Simply guarantee you have got glibc 2.28 or greater

 

// The Obtain Course of

To get the reliable, newest model, skip the third-party mirrors and go on to the official supply: antigravity.google/obtain

As soon as there, you’ll see particular installers for every working system (OS). Obtain the one which matches your machine, run the installer, and launch the appliance. You’ll be requested to arrange your themes and describe how you plan to make use of the Antigravity agent (please persist with the really useful review-driven growth strategy). Then, you’ll be prompted to “Register with Google.” Use the Gmail account you need related together with your AI quotas and cloud tasks.

 

Sign in with GoogleSign in with Google
Signing in with Google to sync cloud tasks | Picture by Creator

 

Navigating the Interface

 
The format is designed to maintain you from alt-tabbing between totally different home windows. Listed below are the 5 areas you’ll spend essentially the most time in:

Editor Panel: The middle stage. That is the VS Code atmosphere the place the agent-generated code seems. You possibly can nonetheless soar in and kind manually everytime you need.

 

Editor PanelEditor Panel
The primary editor panel in Antigravity | Picture by Creator

 

Plan vs. Quick Mode: Within the agent panel, you’ll see a toggle.

  • Plan Mode is for large duties; it generates a “Plan Artifact” so that you can assessment earlier than it begins coding
  • Quick Mode is for fast edits, like “heart this div” or “rename this variable”

 

Plan vs. Fast ModePlan vs. Fast Mode
Toggling between Plan and Quick modes | Picture by Creator

 

Agent Supervisor: That is your mission management. It lists each energetic job, exhibits the agent’s “reasoning” steps, and supplies standing indicators (Working, Success, or Failed)

 

Agent ManagerAgent Manager
Managing energetic AI agent duties | Picture by Creator

 

Artifacts Panel: Consider this because the “Paper Path.” It shops the precise logs, code diffs, and plans that the agent produces

 

Artifacts PanelArtifacts Panel
Reviewing generated artifacts and logs | Picture by Creator

 

Browser Preview: A built-in model of Chrome. When the agent builds an internet app, it robotically launches it right here for testing

 

Browser PreviewBrowser Preview
Testing the net utility within the built-in browser | Picture by Creator

 

Constructing Your First Undertaking: An Infinite Runner Sport

 
To see the ability of agent-driven growth, we may have Antigravity construct a traditional countless runner sport from scratch utilizing HTML, CSS and JavaScript. The purpose is to construct an countless runner internet sport the place the participant controls a automotive touring upwards. The target is to keep away from oncoming site visitors (vehicles shifting downwards). The sport options issue ranges (Straightforward, Medium, Exhausting) and growing velocity because the participant progresses.

 

// Step 1

Launch Antigravity and create a brand new, empty folder. Open this folder within the IDE.

 

// Step 2

Open the Agent Supervisor and click on New Process. Paste the next immediate into the field:

Construct an countless runner sport, the place there’s a automotive touring upward in an countless working method, there are different vehicles coming down in the direction of it, and it has to keep away from them in order to not get hit, as a result of as soon as it hits it, it’s sport over. The sport stage might be modified from simple, medium, to onerous, and the upper you go within the sport, the sooner the vehicles come at you to hit you!

 

Project PromptProject Prompt
Coming into the venture immediate into the agent supervisor | Picture by Creator

 

// Step 3

When you press Enter, the agent initiates its workflow: it analyzes the immediate offered and proceeds to the starting stage of the venture. As soon as that’s completed, coding begins instantly. You might be prompted to just accept some evaluations throughout this course of. Lastly, through the verification stage, the agent will truly try and run the script. If it encounters an error (resembling a lacking library), it’s going to robotically set up the required library and take a look at once more.

Here’s what the implementation plan generated by the agent appears to be like like:

 

Implementation PlanImplementation Plan
The AI-generated implementation plan | Picture by Creator

 

The walk-through file containing all the steps adopted when constructing the countless runner sport:

 

Walk-through FileWalk-through File
Reviewing the step-by-step walk-through | Picture by Creator

 

Here’s what the ultimate output of the sport appears to be like like:

 

Final OutputFinal Output
The ultimate sport interface | Picture by Creator

 

You progress left and proper to keep away from the upcoming vehicles.

 

Game PlayGame Play
Taking part in the countless runner sport | Picture by Creator

 

In case you hit these vehicles, it is sport over.

 

Game OverGame Over
The sport over display screen | Picture by Creator

 

Wrapping Up

 
Google Antigravity is a glimpse right into a future the place “writing code” is only one small a part of being a developer. By delegating the implementation, testing, and debugging to Gemini-powered brokers, you might be free to concentrate on the high-level structure and consumer expertise.

To get essentially the most out of Antigravity, that you must change the way you talk together with your instruments:

  • Be Particular however Purpose-Oriented: Do not inform the agent the best way to write the loop; inform it what the consequence must be
  • Evaluate the Plan: In “Plan Mode,” at all times learn the implementation plan earlier than clicking “Approve.” It saves time in the long term
  • Isolate Duties: Give the agent one clear mission at a time. If you wish to create a login web page and carry out a database migration, run these duties as two separate operations within the Agent Supervisor

 
 

Shittu Olumide is a software program engineer and technical author captivated with leveraging cutting-edge applied sciences to craft compelling narratives, with a eager eye for element and a knack for simplifying advanced ideas. You may as well discover Shittu on Twitter.



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