best ai coding assistant 2026

AI assistants have been widely available for a little more than a year, and they already have access to our most private thoughts and business secrets. People ask them about becoming pregnant or terminating or preventing pregnancy, consult them when considering a divorce, seek information about drug addiction, or ask for edits in emails containing proprietary trade secrets. The providers of these AI-powered chat services are keenly aware of the sensitivity

Published on August 16, 2026 at 12:06 Comment 6 𝕏 Print © magocarlosyo - Pixabay AI continues to surprise its users. A man named Andrew asked his AI assistant to get him a spot in a fully booked sports class. The assistant fulfilled the request… by hacking into the gym’s booking system. The agent, based on OpenClaw and Claude, exploited a security flaw that allowed it to cancel another member’s reservation. A few months ago, Andrew, an Australian employee

Credit: Unsplash/CC0 Public Domain Newly published research from the University of Cincinnati College of Medicine highlights student-led work in medical education and examines how artificial intelligence (AI) can assist with qualitative research. The study, published in the journal Medical Science Educator, explored whether ChatGPT can support thematic analysis. Corresponding author and third-year medical student Jonathan Bowden, of Pickerington, Ohio, col

Graphical abstract. Credit: Nucleic Acids Research (2026). DOI: 10.1093/nar/gkaf1510 MicroRNAs, whose discovery was recognized with the 2025 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine, are central regulators of gene expression, yet a fundamental question has remained unanswered: how cells choose between the two strands produced from each microRNA precursor. A study published in Nucleic Acids Research reveals that this decision follows conserved, programmable ru

Published on September 29, 2026 at 7:28 PM Comment 1 𝕏 Print © 01net Sam Altman has just unveiled “Dots” at the opening keynote of OpenAI’s Dev Days. These AI agents, integrated into ChatGPT, work around the clock on behalf of the user. The company is also launching “ChatGPT Spaces,” a shared workspace for AI agents. OpenAI wants its AI to stop waiting for commands to act. At the opening keynote of the Dev Days, Sam Altman, the head of OpenAI, unveiled “Do

Having hoovered up basically the entire world of literature, music, and visual art, the insatiable AI behemoth has moved on to software. There’s been a constant barrage of headlines over the last few weeks about the latest piece of software to get a vibe-coded “clone”: entire games, big-ticket software packages, and everything in between. These projects have stepped on some of the biggest toes in the world of software development, so it’s perhaps not surpr

Critics hope to keep Elon Musk from escaping a strict data-privacy order imposed by the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) shortly before he took over Twitter. The FTC order placed restrictions on X’s data use for 20 years, while requiring regular independent audits and granting the agency authority to request documents as needed to ensure compliance. The FTC’s action came after Twitter voluntarily disclosed that between May 2013 and September 2019, a coding e

Speaking onstage at TechCrunch Disrupt 2026 on Tuesday, the chipmaker executive answered a question about what would need to happen for AI to become a home appliance, saying, “Actually, I don’t think that’s very far away.” He pointed to the advances in consumer AI agents, like Meta’s Muse and Instinct, the startup now valued at $10 billion, as examples of how AI is finding its footing with everyday users. As for home AI? He predicts that we’ll have persona

IO, the first product from her startup Luka, came before the deep learning breakthroughs that would eventually lead to today’s large language models. “It still worked,” Kuyda told TechCrunch in an exclusive interview. “It was pretty magical … but, of course, it’s nowhere near what we have today.” Luka ended up becoming Replika, the popular AI chatbot companion company. Last year, Kuyda left as CEO of Replika and founded Wabi. The technology has finally cau

OpenAI wasn’t going to be left out. The company released dots, its assistant offering, at its developer day in late September. Alexander Embiricos, who leads OpenAI’s enterprise product team, joined us at TechCrunch Disrupt this month to explain where the product came from — starting with the question of why so many companies seem to be turning to cutesy mascots as avatars for their trillion-parameter matrix multiplication machines. “There’s kind of this c

In an email blast to customers titled “Protecting your finances in the Al World,” Bank of America urged customers to never share their username and password with another person or an outside service, “including an Al-enabled tool or agent that offers to act on your behalf.” You can practically sense the frustration in the person sending the email. Still, customers are increasingly handing over their log-ins as personal AI assistants grow more popular. Shar

Rivian is now licensing elements of its AI voice assistant technology to Volkswagen Group as part of the broader joint venture, according to the company’s third-quarter investor presentation released Thursday. Rivian didn’t disclose the licensing fees, payment terms, or which Volkswagen vehicles will use the technology. However, the AI assistant, which recently rolled out to Rivian vehicles, could make its Volkswagen debut in the automaker’s low-cost EV ca

“I’m really proud of what we accomplished,” Lennon said. “We built an incredible personal assistant with a small team, and learned a ton. I’m grateful to our amazing team, our users, our investors, and everyone who supported us on this journey.” The text-based AI assistant market has exploded over the past year, as the increasingly powerful models that undergird such applications have made them significantly more useful for daily tasks. Ollie, which discus