Bolt IDE

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A privacy-focused fork of VS Code with a bring-your-own-key AI agent layer

Overview · Architecture · Build · Roadmap · Current State

Demo

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Overview

Bolt IDE is a hard fork of microsoft/vscode (currently tracking v1.129.0), rebranded and de-telemetried through a vscodium/ patch layer. On top of that base it adds a custom bring-your-own-key (BYOK) agent layer, so AI-assisted coding works with your own API keys instead of a bundled subscription service.

The editor itself is not forked from any AI agent project — its upstream is microsoft/vscode. The AI agents run as vendored, rebranded extensions inside it:

• vendor/continue — a fork of continuedev/continue, renamed to bolt in package.json, shipped as the extension Bolt Agent (v1.3.41)
• vendor/kilocode — a fork of OpenCodeAI/Kilo (@opencode-ai/core, @kilocode/kilo-console), repackaged as Bolt-coder (v7.4.11), shipped as the extension Bolt coder Shout out to kilocode and cotniue they are Amazing tools you should check them out

Architecture

Custom Bolt code lives mainly in three places:

• src/vs/platform/agentHost/ — BYOK LM bridge, changeset/checkpoint/git services, virtual FS, connection handling, browser/node/electron transports
• src/vs/workbench/contrib/chat/browser/agentSessions/agentHost/ — BYOK wiring: provider bridge, chat box contribution, model providers, auth, settings editors, terminal/snapshot/permissions
• src/vs/sessions/ — a standalone agent-sessions subsystem with its own contribution points and entry points

Everything else follows the standard VS Code layout: src/ (core TypeScript — base, platform, editor, workbench, code, server, monaco), build/ (gulp build system), extensions/ (112 bundled extensions, including the AI ones plus language and tooling extensions), vendor/ (Continue + Kilo), vscodium/ (telemetry/branding strip layer), remote/ (web/code-server), cli/ (Rust code CLI).

Current State

Working:

• Agent-host / BYOK backend and protocol — built and compiling
• BYOK timeout issue fixed; chat works without Copilot via hasByokModels
• 17 providers registered
• Continue and Kilo vendored and rebranded

Not yet working — see Roadmap for details:

• BYOK user-facing UI (API key dialog, provider/model pickers, dynamic model fetching, session wizard) — not started
• VSCodium patching is still a manual step
• Build is mid-migration to a monorepo layout
• Verification is manual

License

MIT License — see LICENSE.txt