Wow Windsurf’s new SWE-1.5 model is shockingly good and ridiculously fast.
SWE-1.5 is giving every developer a perfect sweet spot between lightning speed and high accuracy.
It’s even faster than Claude Haiku 4.5 — the latest Claude model that was specially released for quick coding.
Yet almost as intelligent as Claude Sonnet 4.5 — yet 13 times faster.
You’re barely waiting for any thinking here — near instantaneous responses.
And this isn’t just another “slightly better” model.
SWE-1.5 is frontier-scale — it’s massive under the hood — like hundreds of billions of parameters — optimized for real coding work.
Windsurf built it from the ground up for software engineers who want an AI partner that can read, write, refactor, debug, and explain code across entire projects at rapid pace.
Because every delay adds up when you’re using an assistant that plans, tests, and fixes code in multiple steps.
I mean of course it’s still much faster than manual coding — even if you use GPT-5 High that some people were complaining about the excessive thinking.
But SWE-1.5’s speed means those loop — generating, testing, adjusting — happen almost instantly.
You can keep your focus instead of staring at a loading indicator. Pair-programming with AI feels more natural and conversational.
What it’s built for
Windsurf designed the SWE family (which now includes SWE-1.5) for the full development lifecycle. That means:
- Refactoring large repos — it can understand and safely update multiple files at once.
- Debugging — it can read logs, spot issues, and suggest fixes without losing context.
- Scaffolding new projects — it builds structure fast so you can focus on the creative parts.
- Running tools and tests — the model isn’t just “talking” about code, it’s working with it.
It’s also deeply integrated into Windsurf’s IDE and agent system, which lets it actually do things — not just describe them.
Developers testing SWE-1.5 say it feels like working with a real teammate. You can throw complex refactors at it and it responds in seconds instead of minutes. The result is more experimentation, faster debugging, and fewer context switches.
These are the things that elevate the development experience significantly.
Try it now
SWE-1.5 is already live in the Windsurf IDE. If you’re on a Pro plan, you can use it right now; there’s also a free tier if you want to take it for a spin.
SWE-1.5 isn’t just about a bigger model number. It’s about speed that changes how you code. If you’ve ever wished your AI assistant could keep up with your thought process, this might be the first one that truly does.