The AI coding boom comes with a hefty price tag—unless you switch to an open-source alternative. Goose, a free AI coding agent developed by Block (formerly Square), rivals Anthropic's Claude Code in functionality but runs entirely on your local machine with no subscription fees, no cloud dependency, and no rate limits.
Goose can write, debug, and deploy code autonomously, just like Claude Code, but it gives developers full control. It works offline, can be used with any large language model, and ensures your data never leaves your computer. The project has exploded in popularity on GitHub, boasting over 26,000 stars and 362 contributors.
This comes as many developers revolt against Claude Code's pricing structure. Anthropic's Pro plan ($20/month) limits users to 10-40 prompts every five hours—insufficient for intensive work. Even the $200/month Max plan imposes confusing token-based caps that some users exhaust in 30 minutes. Goose eliminates these frustrations by being completely free and unrestricted.
Goose is model-agnostic: you can connect it to Anthropic's Claude, OpenAI's GPT-5, Google's Gemini, or run open-source models locally via tools like Ollama. This flexibility, combined with zero cost, makes it appealing for developers who want AI assistance without the bill.