Cursor 0.44: Background Agent Runs Tests & Pushes to Branches

Cursor 0.44 ships Background Agent — a fully autonomous coding agent that runs in a remote sandboxed environment. It can execute your test suite, iterate on failures, commit code, and push to feature branches, all while you do other work.

This is the first Cursor feature that genuinely removes you from the edit-run-fix loop. Point it at a failing test or a GitHub issue, go make coffee, and come back to a PR. For solo developers, it multiplies your effective output without requiring you to sit and watch an AI code.

Open the Command Palette → 'Start Background Agent'. Describe the task in natural language. The agent spins up a fresh environment, clones your repo, and begins. You get async notifications when it finishes or needs clarification. Connect GitHub for auto-PR creation.