Cursor alternative, EU-based or privacy-focused?

I don’t use A.I. tools when I am developing. I can’t help there. I can say avoid VS Code. It’s a terrible code editor now. Microsoft has stuffed it with A.I. bloat and telemetry. You can turn off these settings but it’s a pain.

Other choices without me knowing your OS or the primary languages you use:

1. VS Codium (free/open source) Not sure about the A.I. features. More privacy than VS Code without telemetry. Not all VS Code extensions will be available (niche ones).
2. Webstorm / PyCharm (free) From EU company, Jetbrains, based in the Netherlands. Jetbrains has a ton of IDE’s for different languages. To my knowledge they don’t have an all in one code editor*, Webstorm used to cost £60 if I remember correctly. PyCharm comes with a pro option for £200/year. The AI free plan comes with their IDE’s. More info on JetBrains AI and the list of features, pricing, and availability for each IDE. You have to disable data collection in the settings. “ Settings | Appearance & Behavior | System Settings | Data Sharing”.
3. Neovim / Helix (free) Options for VIM devs. Here’s a list of A.I. plugins for neovim. No telemetry that I know of. A build yourself option.

Never pay for an IDE out of pocket. Your company will pay for it. If you aren’t working I’d stick with a free option. Nearly all IDE’s and code editors are free.

*An IDE is an integrated development environment. A code editor is not the same. A code editor is closer to a text editor with syntax highlighting and auto complete usually requiring several extensions or plugins to add language specific auto complete suggestions and debugging tools. An IDE is more robust out of the box and language specific which is why JetBrains has a lot of products, they build IDE’s not editors.