I Built a CLI to Use Free Web-Based AI Chatbots for Real Development Work — No API Keys, No Extensions

I wanted to use web-based AI chatbots — Claude, Gemini, ChatGPT, Qwen — for actual development work, not just Q&A. The free tiers are generous, and I didn't want to be locked into a single coding agent or pay for API access just to get an assistant to touch my code. But the moment you try to actually use a web chat for real dev work, you hit the same wall every time: you either paste in your whole codebase manually every session, or you give up and reach for a paid extension with an API key behind it. So I built AI Bridge — a CLI tool that bridges a local codebase and any browser-based AI chatbot. No API keys, no extensions running in the background, no vendor lock-in. You pack your code, paste it into whichever AI chat you're using, and apply the changes back with a command. Why not just use Copilot, Cursor, or an API key? Coding agent apps and API-based tools work, but they come with tradeoffs I wanted to avoid: Web-based AI chat plans are usually more generous on the free tier than API usage I'm not locked into one provider — I can switch models mid-project depending on which one is handling a task better There's no background agent or extension — it's just a CLI and whatever chat tab I already have open The tradeoff is that browser chats don't have direct filesystem access. AI Bridge closes that gap without turning it into full manual copy-pasting. How it works There are two modes, depending on project size. Simple Mode is for projects small enough to fit in a single prompt. You pack the codebase, upload it along with a couple of prompt templates, and apply the AI's response back to your files: dotnet tool install --global Tools.AIBridge cd /path/to/your-project ai-bridge init ai-bridge pack # Upload ai-bridge/1-SimpleMode/*.md + the generated context files to your AI # Copy the AI's response, then: ai-bridge apply --paste Advanced Mode is for larger codebases, where uploading everything every time burns tokens and adds noise. Instead, you generate a one-time in