AWS engineers launched a new coding agent project into public preview this week that they claim will help developers go beyond vibe coding prototypes into production-ready systems.
The Kiro AI IDE project -- led by Deepak Singh, vice president of developer agents and experiences at AWS, and Nikhil Swaminathan, a senior manager of product and experience for agentic AI developer tools at AWS -- launched Monday without overt fanfare from the cloud provider. AWS already has Amazon Q Developer tools that include coding agents, as do Microsoft GitHub Copilot and JetBrains.
The major differences between other agentic IDEs and Kiro are twofold: a lack of heavy tie-ins to AWS, and an emphasis on specification-driven development, according to an industry analyst who had early testing access to Kiro. Often used in API development, spec-driven development emphasizes defining a software system's structure and behavior before code is written.
"The first thing [Kiro] asks you when you start a new project is, 'Do you want to start with spec, or do you want to start with prompts?'" said Jason Andersen, an analyst at Moor Insights & Strategy. "It's allowing you to choose, do you want to be the navigator or the pilot? When you're doing everything with prompts, you're turning a lot over to the AI to do the design work -- you're in the driver's seat with the spec."
It's allowing you to choose, do you want to be the navigator or the pilot? When you're doing everything with prompts, you're turning a lot over to the AI to do the design work -- you're in the driver's seat with the spec.
Jason AndersenAnalyst, Moor Insights & Strategy
Other vibe coding tools emphasize prompt engineering rather than specs when creating applications, which development experts have described as useful for quick prototypes but unsuited to enterprise production. Kiro's founders said in a blog post this week that the project's coding agents can break down natural language prompts into structured artifacts that include requirements, design and task documents, improving organizational control and team collaboration over prompt-based vibe coding.
"[Vibe coding is] fun and feels like magic. But getting it to production requires more," according to the blog post. "Sometimes it's better to take a step back, think through decisions, and you'll end up with a better application that you can easily maintain. That's what Kiro helps you do with spec-driven development."
Other AI IDEs, such as Cursor and Windsurf, can also accommodate specifications, but they aren't as prominently featured in those tools' user interfaces, according to Andersen.
Coding agents in other IDEs can be directed to follow a specified process in creating code and using tools, but Kiro's agents walk users through the process. Kiro also embeds hooks, which automatically execute predefined agent actions when specific events occur in the AI IDE, such as saving, creating or deleting files.
"With hooks, you eliminate the need to manually request routine tasks and ensure consistency across your codebase," according to Kiro's documentation.
Kiro keeps AWS cloud ties light
The project entered the preview stage this week without official branding from AWS and few references acknowledging the connection, such as its attribution on its website to a "small, opinionated team within AWS." Amazon Q Developer Pro customers can access Kiro using their AWS IAM ID, according to a Kiro FAQ, but it isn't required to install the tool. Kiro is based on Code-OSS, the open source core of the Visual Studio (VS) Code IDE, so users can import their VS Code settings, themes and plugins. Users can also log into Kiro with a GitHub, Google or AWS Builder ID.
The loose coupling between Kiro and other AWS cloud services represents a departure from the company's typical approach, Andersen noted.
"They've come to realize that strategically, having everything they do with application developers kind of hard-wired into their cloud and their branding kind of turns people off," he said. "If you're not an AWS customer, then why use the tool? That kind of stymies adoption."
But in the short term, without the AWS label prominently displayed, Kiro could be at a disadvantage against ubiquitously used tools such as GitHub Copilot, Andersen said.
"Adoption is really going to be a function of what type of ecosystem they build, and [AWS] leadership is going to need to be patient because these things take a while to develop," he said. "My sense is … now that [Kiro] has the code out the door, [AWS] has to focus on ecosystem building externally and some change management internally."
Within the AWS product portfolio, Kiro offers an IDE-based alternative to the Amazon Q Developer CLI, according to an AWS spokesperson in an email to Informa TechTarget.
Another industry analyst who tested Kiro said the tool appears to effectively support multiple clouds.
"I was encouraged to see Kiro accept my prompts to migrate their tutorial from AWS services to Azure without complaint," said Andrew Cornwall, an analyst at Forrester Research. "That makes it useful to people who aren't AWS developers."
However, Cornwall said he isn't sure how useful the tool will be for developers working with existing codebases.
"The problems those developers have today with misaligned requirements will be amplified by a platform like Kiro that is based on those requirements," he said.
When the product becomes generally available, users will be able to get up to 50 agentic IDE interactions per month in the product's free tier, 1,000 interactions per month in a $19 per user per month Kiro Pro tier, and up to 3,000 interactions per month in a $39 per-user, per-month Kiro Pro+ tier, according to a Kiro pricing page.
Beth Pariseau, a senior news writer for Informa TechTarget, is an award-winning veteran of IT journalism covering DevOps. Have a tip? Email her or reach out @PariseauTT.
