Windsurf’s Cascade unlocks a new level of collaboration between human and AI. To open Cascade, press Cmd/Ctrl+Lclick the Cascade icon in the top right corner of the Windsurf window. Any selected text in the editor or terminal will automatically be included.

Web Search

Search the web for information to be referenced in Cascade’s suggestions.

Memories & Rules

Memories and rules help customize behavior.

MCP

MCP servers extend the agent’s capabilities.

Terminal

An upgraded Terminal experience.

Workflows

Automate repetitive trajectories.

App Deploys

Deploy applications in one click.

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Model selection

Select your desired model from the selection menu below the Cascade conversation input box. Click below too see the full list of the available models and their availability across different plans and pricing.

Models

Model availability in Windsurf.

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Write/Chat Modes

Cascade comes in two modes: Write and Chat. Write mode allows Cascade to create and make modifications to your codebase, while Chat mode is optimized for questions around your codebase or general coding principles. While in Chat mode, Cascade may propose new code to you. If you accept it, it will be added to your codebase.

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Tool Calling

Cascade has a variety of tools at its disposal, such as Search, Analyze, Web Search, MCP, and the terminal. It can detect which packages and tools that you’re using, which ones need to be installed, and even install them for you. Just ask Cascade how to run your project and press Accept.
Cascade can make up to 20 tool calls per prompt. If the trajectory stops, simply press the continue button and Cascade will resume from where it left off. However, each continue will count as a new prompt credit due to tool calling costs.
You can configure an Auto-Continue setting to have Cascade automatically continue its response if it hits a limit. These will consume a prompt credit(s) corresponding to the model you are using.

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Voice input

Use Voice input to use your voice to interact with Cascade. In its current form it can transcribe your speech to text.

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Named Checkpoints and Reverts

You have the ability to revert changes that Cascade has made. Simply hover your mouse over the original prompt and click on the revert arrow on the right, or revert directly from the table of contents. This will revert all code changes back to the state of your codebase at the desired step.
Reverts are currently irreversible, so be careful!
You can also create a named snapshot/checkpoint of the current state of your project from within the conversation, which you can easily navigate to and revert at any time.

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Real-time awareness

A unique capability of Windsurf and Cascade is that it is aware of your real-time actions, removing the need to prompt with context on your prior actions. Simply instruct Cascade to “Continue”.

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Send problems to Cascade

When you have problems in your code which show up in the Problems panel at the bottom of the editor, simply click the Send to Cascade button to bring them into the Cascade panel as an @ mention.

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Explain and fix

For any errors that you run into from within the editor, you can simply highlight the error and click Explain and Fix to have Cascade fix it for you.

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Ignoring files

If you’d like Cascade to ignore files, you can add your files to .codeiumignore at the root of your workspace. This will prevent Cascade from viewing, editing or creating files inside of the paths designated. You can declare the file paths in a format similar to .gitignore.

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Linter integration

Cascade can automatically fix linting errors on generated code. This is turned on by default, but it can be disabled by clicking Auto-fix on the tool call, and clicking disable. This edit will not consume any credits.
When Cascade makes an edit with the primary goal of fixing lints that it created and auto-detected, it may discount the edit to be free of credit charge. This is in recognition of the fact that fixing lint errors increases the number of tool calls that Cascade makes.

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Sounds for Cascade

Play a sound when Cascade finishes a trajectory to let you know when it’s done. You can enable it via Windsurf Settings > Cascade > Enable Sounds for Cascade.

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Sharing your conversation

This feature is currently only available for Teams and Enterprise customers. Currently not available to Hybrid customers.
You can share your Cascade trajectories with your team by clicking the ... Additional options button in the top right of the Cascade panel, and clicking Share Conversation.

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@-mention previous conversations

You can also reference previous conversations with other conversations via an @-mention. When you do this, Cascade will retrieve the most relevant and useful information like the conversation summaries and checkpoints, and specific parts of the conversation that you query for. It typically will not retrieve the full conversation as to not overwhelm the context window.

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Simultaneous Cascades

Users can have multiple Cascades running simultaneously. You can navigate between them using the dropdown menu in the top left of the Cascade panel.
If two Cascades edit the same file at the same time, the edits can race, and sometimes the second edit will fail.