[DigitalToday reporter Jinju Hong] AI coding startup Cursor has launched an India-only subscription plan, Cursor Start, stepping up its push into the local market.

On July 28 local time, IT outlet TechCrunch reported that Cursor introduced a new plan priced at 649 rupees a month, about $7. That is sharply lower than its existing $20-a-month Pro subscription.

The plan is Cursor's first case of setting separate pricing by country. Cursor said India is already its third-largest market globally and the region with the highest concentration of power users. The number of users in India has more than tripled over the past year.

Simon Green (사이먼 그린), Cursor head of Asia Pacific and Japan, said the company chose India as the first market for localized pricing because it saw an opportunity to scale by adjusting its commercial model to local conditions. He said India's technical capabilities and existing engineering talent pool create a very natural fit.

Cursor Start offers higher usage limits than the free plan. It provides access to Cursor's Composer 2.5 model and Grok 4.5, and includes cloud agents, an iOS app, plugins, support for the Model Context Protocol, hooks and skills. Unlike the higher-tier Pro plan, it does not offer OpenAI and Anthropic's top AI models, BugBot, Auto mode, automation or the Cursor SDK.

Cursor said the low-priced plan is aimed at capturing demand between the free tier and the Pro subscription rather than replacing its main product. Green said the lower-price structure is not a loss-leading approach. He said it is designed around Cursor's own AI models, reducing reliance on external top-tier models and, in turn, cutting operating costs.

The company also tailored payment options for the Indian market. Cursor bills in Indian rupees and supports UPI, India's Unified Payments Interface, in addition to credit and debit cards. It will limit the plan to individual users residing in India and plans to apply multiple checks to block access through virtual private networks.

Cursor's expansion in India goes beyond pricing. The company recently hired its first sales staff in India and expects additional leadership to join in New Delhi. It is building a government relations organisation and is also adding 3 technical customer support staff. It is also expanding local bases in Bengaluru, Chennai, Hyderabad and Mumbai.

Its push into India's corporate market is at an early stage. Cursor said adoption so far has centered on individual developers, startups and universities. It said it sees significant opportunities at banks and large companies as it expands local sales.

The move also intersects with competition among global AI companies in India. OpenAI and Anthropic have also introduced India-specific pricing plans over the past year. Cursor said it could expand its localized pricing policy to other regions if this model delivers results. Green said the company will continue doing everything it can to grow demand and support existing customers, and said the model could be applied to other markets if it works.

Cursor's expansion in India also coincides with the timing of SpaceX's acquisition process. SpaceX agreed to acquire Cursor in an all-stock deal worth about $60 billion, and the deal is expected to be completed in the third quarter. Cursor said it will continue to operate independently until the deal closes and that it had been pursuing its India expansion plan since before the acquisition announcement. Once the deal is completed, SpaceX's presence in India through Starlink could lower commercial and operational barriers and potentially accelerate Cursor's local expansion.