Why We're Making Kilo’s Gateway and Cloud Backend Source-Available
AI tooling shouldn't be a black box. So we're opening ours up.
On February 6, 2026, we’ll release the source code for Kilo Gateway and our Cloud backend infrastructure on GitHub under our Kilo-Org. This has been part of our roadmap from the beginning, and we’re six days away from shipping it.
Most AI coding platforms operate as black boxes. You send a prompt, get code back, and everything in between stays hidden. We think transparency matters more than that, especially for infrastructure developers who rely on these systems daily. When you can read the code, audit it, and understand how decisions get made, trust follows naturally.
Why We Built Kilo This Way
Kilo was built on the belief that developer infrastructure should be open and something you can rely on. When developers can see how a system works, they make better decisions, contribute improvements, and feel confident building on it long-term. And we want that to include even our Cloud and Gateway systems - if they are source available they benefit from our incredible community of developers. If you have a great idea on how we could improve token or cache efficiency - or maybe a cool new idea for sharing state across sessions? You can now inspect the code and even contribute those ideas directly.
This gives developers real visibility into how Kilo operates. This is the foundation we believe an agentic engineering platform should be built on, and it’s how we’ve built Kilo from day one.
What Source-Available Means
Source-available software sits between fully proprietary systems and open source licenses approved by the Open Source Initiative.
With source-available code, you can read it, audit it for security or compliance, learn from the architecture, and contribute improvements. What you generally can’t do is take that code and use it outside of development or offer a competing hosted service. That’s different from pure open source licenses like Apache 2.0 or MIT, which grant broader commercial redistribution rights.
Some of our code already uses Apache 2.0 with irrevocable licenses. Those pieces are permanently open and cannot be closed off, regardless of what happens to Klio as a company.
For the Gateway and cloud infrastructure, source-available gives you visibility and contribution rights while protecting the hosted service itself.
What We’re Releasing
Our VS Code extension, JetBrains plugin, and CLI already ship under Apache 2.0. Those licenses are irrevocable. Whatever happens to Kilo as a company, that code stays open permanently.
By February 6th, we’re making source available:
Kilo Gateway, the code that connects you to 500+ models
Kilo Cloud, including:
The only code that will remain private is our abuse-protection system to make sure Kilo remains safe and available for everyone. Everything else becomes visible and open to contributions.
Our Co-Founder’s Track Record Matters
Sid Sijbrandij, who co-founded Kilo, also co-founded GitLab which is still open 11 years later. He later founded Open Core Ventures, focused on building long-lasting companies around open foundations. This wasn’t a marketing strategy for him, it was a genuine belief about how to build software that lasts.
The open core model works when core functionality stays open and you never pull a bait-and-switch on your community. Features that start open stay open. Enterprise additions can be proprietary, but the foundation remains available to the community.
That same principle guides how we’re building Kilo.
Supporting Contributors
We’re putting money behind community participation. Every PR merged to Kilo in February earns $150 in credits. There’s no cap—merge five PRs and you get $750. We’re also flying up to five major contributors to our Quarterly Focus Week in Amsterdam (expenses paid) for an in-person building session.
This isn’t about volume or speed. It’s about rewarding thoughtful contributions as more of the stack becomes open and collaborative.
The Kilo Champion program recognizes active contributors, and we welcome developers from other AI coding projects who want to explore what we’re building. If you’re interested in contributing, email oss@kilo.ai.
Code you contribute to the open source parts of Kilo stays open source permanently.
What This Means for Different Users
Developers can read the code starting February 6th to understand how Kilo works internally. Contributions are welcomed and rewarded.
Enterprise teams can audit the source for security and compliance requirements. You can extend it with internal tooling and verify that there are no black-box risks in critical infrastructure.
If you’re learning, the production architecture becomes educational material. You can fork it, modify it, and understand by building. And we’re even more excited to see what the community will contribute to make Kilo Gateway and Kilo Cloud better.
Our community already has over 11,000 developers. Join the Discord for real-time discussion, star the GitHub repos, and look for issues tagged “good first issue” if you want to start contributing.
Our Commitments
AI is too important to lock behind proprietary walls. We’re building an agentic engineering platform that developers can trust, inspect, and help improve.
February 6th is a milestone in a roadmap we’ve been following all along.
We believe the future of AI tools should be open. If this is something you want to build with us, we’ll be ready for you.