If you were looking for "Gemini CLI" as a free terminal agent to use instead of Claude Code, the news is not good. Since 18 June 2026 Gemini CLI no longer serves requests from personal users. What follows, in order: what happened, what replaced it, and what to use if you still need an agent.
What happened to Gemini CLI
Gemini CLI is an open-source terminal agent from Google under the Apache 2.0 license, installed with npm install -g @google/gemini-cli. We opened the README and Google's announcement on 2 November 2026 and retell them close to the text.
- On 19 May 2026 the Google Developers blog published a post about the move from Gemini CLI to Antigravity CLI.
- On 18 June 2026 Gemini CLI and the Gemini Code Assist extensions for IDEs stopped serving Google AI Pro and Ultra users, as well as personal users of the free Gemini Code Assist.
- Access did not change for organizations with Gemini Code Assist Standard or Enterprise licenses. Gemini CLI also still works with paid Gemini API keys and Gemini Enterprise Agent Platform.
- The banner in the README is blunt: the tool is built for enterprise Code Assist licenses, and it has no free tier and no Google AI plans. It is also not optimized for the Gemini 4 series of models.
So most searches for "Gemini CLI free" and "download Gemini CLI" end in a dead end. You can still download the open-source code, but it no longer serves a personal account.
What Antigravity CLI is
According to the announcement, Antigravity CLI is a new terminal interface inside the Google Antigravity platform. The authors write that it is built in Go, runs several agents in the background and keeps the main capabilities of Gemini CLI: skills, hooks, subagents and extensions (which are now called plugins). There is no one-to-one match of features yet, and the announcement says so directly. The agy command is mentioned in the Gemini CLI README.
What we did not find. The announcement and the product page contain no list of supported countries. They give no price, no install command and no description of how to sign in either. So we cannot say whether Antigravity CLI will open from Russia or what it costs. Check Google's download page.
Is Gemini available from Russia
For the Gemini API and Google AI Studio themselves, the answer is definite. Google's page on available regions lists the countries and territories where the API and AI Studio work. Russia is not on it. How to get a key, and what to do if your country is not on the list, is covered in the article Gemini API: how to get a key and use it from Russia.
What to use instead of Claude Code
If you need a terminal agent for code, the choice today looks like this. The table holds only what we verified against the documentation and READMEs on the date of the article.
| Tool | Status on 2 November 2026 | What to know |
|---|---|---|
| Gemini CLI | Closed to personal users since 18 June 2026 | Works for organizations with Code Assist Standard or Enterprise and with paid API keys |
| Antigravity CLI | Successor to Gemini CLI | Public texts give no country list, price or sign-in description, so check for yourself |
| Codex CLI | Supports sign-in with a separate API key | Russia is not on OpenAI's list, the gateway route is described in the Codex article |
| Qwen Code | Open source, Apache 2.0 | The Coding Plan Lite tier has been closed to new subscriptions since 20 March 2026, see the Qwen Code article |
| OpenCode | Open source, MIT | codexkey models connect in opencode.json, see the OpenCode article |
| Kimi Code | Open source, MIT | Sign-in with a Kimi subscription or a Moonshot key, see the Kimi Code article |
| Claude Code | Free tool, needs access to a model | Connects to a gateway through environment variables, guide |
How well an agent works depends heavily on the model underneath. The honest way to choose is to run three or four of your own real tasks on two options and compare the result with the cost. How to run such a measurement is explained in Your own model benchmark. Claude Code and Codex are set side by side in a separate piece, and a general overview of the tools is in Claude Code alternatives.
If you specifically need Claude
Claude Code remains one of the workable options for a terminal agent, provided you have access to the models. Through codexkey it connects with an sk_cdx_... key and the ANTHROPIC_BASE_URL variable, and Gemini and GPT models open with the same key through an OpenAI-compatible address. The caveat is the same as in our other articles. This does not cancel Anthropic's regional policy, which takes effect on 12 November 2026, and we give no guarantees for the future. What to do in advance is described in the checklist for 12 November, and what is known about the policy itself is in Does Claude work in Russia. If your Claude account is blocked, read Claude account banned, and moving a project to a gateway is covered in Migrating a project to a gateway.
FAQ
Does Gemini CLI still work?
For organizations with Gemini Code Assist Standard or Enterprise licenses, and for users of paid API keys, yes. For Google AI Pro, Ultra and free personal accounts it stopped serving requests on 18 June 2026.
What replaced Gemini CLI?
Google names Antigravity CLI as the successor. Features do not fully match yet, and we found no public text with a list of countries.
Does Gemini CLI work in Russia?
The Gemini API and Google AI Studio are available only in the countries on Google's page, and Russia is not among them. For personal users Gemini CLI is closed in any case.
Is there a free alternative to Claude Code?
Open-source agents such as Qwen Code, OpenCode and Kimi Code install for free, but you pay for the models under them, and tariff terms change. Check prices on the official pages on the day you choose.
Which is better, Gemini CLI or Claude Code?
You have to compare the models on your own tasks. An agent without a model solves nothing, and a test on two or three real assignments gives a more accurate answer than any ranking.