How to set up Cursor

Open Safari or Chrome and go to cursor.com. Click Download (prefer the Apple Silicon build on M-series Macs). Open the .dmg, drag Cursor into Applications, then open Applications and double-click Cursor. If macOS only warns that the app was downloaded from the internet, click Open.

The common Gatekeeper failure is “Cursor.app is damaged and can’t be opened,” which Open does not fix. In Terminal run xattr -cr /Applications/Cursor.app, or install with Homebrew: brew install --cask cursor. Then reopen from Applications.

xattr -cr /Applications/Cursor.app

You should see: The command finishes without an error before you continue.

Go to cursor.com and download the Windows installer. Prefer the User installer on locked-down or non-admin machines (installs under your profile). Avoid installing both User and System copies — dual installs break updates. If SmartScreen appears, choose More info → Run anyway only after confirming the publisher is Anysphere, Inc., then launch from the Start menu.

Official repository path from Cursor’s quickstart. Prefer this over a random .deb so updates keep working.

curl -fsSL https://downloads.cursor.com/keys/anysphere.asc | gpg --dearmor | sudo tee /etc/apt/keyrings/cursor.gpg > /dev/null && echo "deb [arch=amd64,arm64 signed-by=/etc/apt/keyrings/cursor.gpg] https://downloads.cursor.com/aptrepo stable main" | sudo tee /etc/apt/sources.list.d/cursor.list > /dev/null && sudo apt update && sudo apt install cursor

You should see: The installer finishes without an error. Open a new terminal before the verify step so PATH updates apply.

Official yum/dnf repository. AppImage from cursor.com/downloads is the portable fallback.

sudo tee /etc/yum.repos.d/cursor.repo << 'EOF'
[cursor]
name=Cursor
baseurl=https://downloads.cursor.com/yumrepo
enabled=1
gpgcheck=1
gpgkey=https://downloads.cursor.com/keys/anysphere.asc
EOF
sudo dnf install cursor

You should see: The installer finishes without an error. Open a new terminal before the verify step so PATH updates apply.

Click Sign in and finish the browser login. Before opening a private repo, open Settings and turn Privacy Mode on if you do not want code used to improve Cursor or provider models. Privacy Mode is a setting (teams can enforce it) — it is not the same as “paid plan only.” Indexing still uploads chunks to build embeddings; embeddings and some metadata can persist even when plaintext is discarded.

Quit and reopen Cursor from Applications (Mac) or the Start menu (Windows) if the first launch failed or stalled. You should reach the editor shell and be able to open File → Open Folder before continuing.

You should see: Cursor opens, sign-in completes, and you can open a folder. If macOS says the app is damaged, use the Gatekeeper fix in the step above — do not keep clicking Open on a quarantined copy.

Use File → Open Folder… and pick a non-production project. Wait for indexing to finish before big questions. Add a .cursorignore for secrets (.env, keys, pem files) — note that ignore rules do not block the agent’s terminal or MCP from reading files if a command is allowed.

One-click VS Code import pulls settings, keybindings, themes, and extensions together — there is no “settings only” toggle. After import, disable competing AI completion extensions (for example Copilot) so Tab and shortcuts do not fight. If something breaks, remove extensions one at a time. You can also import later from Cursor Settings → General → Account → VS Code Import.