JetBrains Air in IDEs: requirements, costs and a first trial

Editorial update October 4, 2026. Clarified requirements, billing, cloud eligibility and the limits of advertised capabilities. Added a practical trial plan; we have not tested Air ourselves. This update was prepared with AI using the linked sources.

JetBrains has opened the EAP for Air in IDEs, an interface for working with multiple AI agents. JetBrains announcement. The assistant zoo gets a control room: sessions across projects, changed files and commits can be tracked together. Session overview. Checking what those assistants actually wrote remains the developer’s job. This article covers the IDE plugin, rather than the separate Air desktop app.

Installation requirements

For JetBrains IDEs 2026.2, install the plugin from Marketplace; it is bundled with 2026.3 EAP builds. Check your particular build’s compatibility in Marketplace. The official documentation excludes Android Studio. Air requires no separate plugin license and supplies no AI models of its own. Requirements and overview

What is free and what costs extra

The plugin is free, but an agent may require its own account or subscription. JetBrains AI is optional for local work with an agent that supports another authorization method. Billing follows your selected provider and account. Getting started

JetBrains offers free Junie Lite after signing into a JetBrains Account; terms and available models may change. Junie Lite conditions. If you choose paid JetBrains AI, personal plans billed monthly cost $10 USD for Pro or $30 USD for Ultimate. Those are AI-service prices, not plugin fees; check the final amount before subscribing. Official pricing

Claude subscribers need to watch one distinction: their subscription works through Claude Code in Air’s terminal interface. Claude Agent in graphical chat requires JetBrains AI or Anthropic API authentication with API billing. Similar names can be surprisingly efficient at producing extra bills. Authorization options

Limits to check before starting

• Cloud runs are restricted. Your organization must be eligible in JetBrains Central, with cloud tasks enabled by its administrator. Personal licenses cannot use cloud runs. Air needs access to a GitHub or GitLab repository, with the required commits pushed to the remote branch. Uncommitted local changes will not reach that cloud run. Cloud requirements
• The cost counter has limits. Figures come from the agent or provider; for some agents they are approximate or unavailable. Check them against provider billing. Session costs
• Token savings are not guaranteed. JetBrains describes IDE tools and skills for supported agents, with potential token reductions on some tasks. That is a vendor claim, not something we have measured. Air capabilities
• AI Assistant remains available. Installing Air through the AI Assistant notification disables AI Assistant; you can enable it again in Settings → Plugins. Installation-path explanation

Try one task before recruiting an agent army

For a first trial, we suggest a practice repository without secrets and one small, reproducible bug. Keep a separate copy of the starting state. Record the IDE version, agent, model and billing method; otherwise the comparison quickly becomes a contest of impressions.

1. Open the project, select an agent and check its account. Review the access level before starting: which actions can it perform without confirmation?
2. Start a session in Temporary Worktree mode to separate working changes. A worktree helps organize Git work; do not rely on it as a backup or a boundary for all the agent’s permissions.
3. Give it a narrow task: “Reproduce the bug, add a regression test and propose a minimal fix. Do not change dependencies or push commits to the remote repository.” Attach the relevant files and expected behavior.
4. Review the entire diff and run the tests yourself. Record the outcome, review time, manual corrections and available cost figures. Keep changes only after that check.

This is a proposed procedure, not a completed experiment. We have not measured speed, memory use or token savings. For the interface steps, see the official quickstart and worktree instructions.

Tried it? Share your IDE version, agent, task and what you had to fix manually in the comments. Leave out private code and secrets. A concrete example beats another prediction of the profession’s imminent extinction.