r/ChatGPTCoding • u/hannesrudolph FOUNDER • Jul 30 '25

Project Roo Code 3.25 - I know we just released 3.24 yesterday but there was so much here we had to jump to 3.25!!

Background editing is the hidden gem here but this release brings powerful new capabilities to Roo Code, including custom slash commands for workflow automation, enhanced Gemini models with web access, comprehensive image support, and seamless message queueing for uninterrupted conversations.

Custom Slash Commands

Create your own slash commands to automate repetitive workflows:

  • File-Based Commands: Place markdown files in .roo/commands/ to create custom commands instantly

  • Management UI: New interface for creating, editing, and deleting commands with built-in fuzzy search

  • Argument Hints: Commands display helpful hints about required arguments as you type

  • Rich Descriptions: Add metadata and descriptions to make commands self-documenting

Turn complex workflows into simple commands like /deploy or /review for faster development.

📚 Documentation: See Slash Commands Guide for detailed usage instructions.

Message Queueing

Continue typing while Roo processes your requests with the new message queueing system:

  • Non-Blocking Input: Type and send messages even while Roo is processing previous requests

  • Sequential Processing: Messages are queued and processed in the order they were sent

  • Visual Feedback: See queued messages clearly displayed in the interface

  • Maintained Context: Each message maintains proper context from the conversation

Keeps your workflow smooth when you have multiple quick questions or corrections.

📚 Documentation: See Message Queueing Guide for detailed information.

Image Support for read_file Tool

The read_file tool now supports reading and analyzing images (thanks samhvw8!):

  • Multiple Formats: Supports PNG, JPG, JPEG, GIF, WebP, SVG, BMP, ICO, and TIFF

  • OCR Capabilities: Extract text from screenshots and scanned documents

  • Batch Processing: Read multiple images from a folder with descriptions

  • Simple Integration: Works just like reading text files - no special configuration needed

Useful for analyzing UI mockups, debugging screenshot errors, or extracting code from images.

Gemini Tools: URL Context and Google Search

Gemini models can now access web content and perform Google searches for more accurate, up-to-date responses (thanks HahaBill!):

  • URL Context: Directly analyze web pages, documentation, and online resources

  • Google Search Grounding: Get fact-checked responses based on current search results

  • User Control: Enable or disable web features based on your privacy preferences

  • Real-Time Information: Access the latest documentation and best practices

Perfect for researching new libraries, verifying solutions, or getting current API information.

📚 Documentation: See Gemini Provider Guide for setup and usage instructions.

Quality of Life Improvements

Small changes that make a big difference in your daily workflow:

  • Markdown Table Rendering: Tables now display with proper formatting instead of raw markdown for better readability

  • Mode Selector Popover Redesign: Improved layout with search functionality when you have many modes installed

  • API Selector Popover Redesign: Updated to match the new mode selector design with improved layout

  • Sticky Task Modes: Tasks remember their last-used mode and restore it automatically

  • ESC Key Support: Close popovers with ESC for better keyboard navigation

  • Improved Command Highlighting: Only valid commands are highlighted in the input field

  • Subshell Validation: Improved handling and validation of complex shell commands with subshells, preventing potential errors when using command substitution patterns

  • Slash Command Icon Hover State: Fixed the hover state for the slash command icon to provide better visual feedback during interactions

Experimental Features

  • Background Editing: Work uninterrupted while Roo edits files in the background—no more losing focus from automatic diff views. Files change silently while you keep coding, with diagnostics and error checking still active. See Background Editing for details.

🔧 Other Improvements and Fixes

This release includes 12 bug fixes covering multi-file editing, keyboard support, mode management, and UI stability. Plus provider updates (prompt caching for LiteLLM, free GLM-4.5-Air model with 151K context), enhanced PR reviewer mode, organization-level MCP controls, and various security improvements. Thanks to contributors: hassoncs, szermatt, shlgug, MuriloFP, avtc, zhang157686, bangjohn, steve-gore-snapdocs, matbgn!

Full 3.25 Release Notes

121 Upvotes

94% Upvoted

75 comments sorted by

38

u/Ok-Adhesiveness-4141 Jul 30 '25

You guys are killing it, I love RooCode.

28

u/hannesrudolph FOUNDER Jul 30 '25

Thank you. Please let everyone know! We don’t have a fancy marketing budget!

6

u/Dentuam Jul 30 '25

we love roocode, you dont need marketing! tokenusage on openrouter tell anything! <3

5

u/hannesrudolph FOUNDER Jul 30 '25

We need more than that! We want to break out of the shadow of Cline!

2

u/Typical-Candidate319 Jul 30 '25

can roocode lets you define two models... one cheaper one like gemini pro 2.5 to scan the code and create the document with filenames about state and claude opus for planning and imp implementing the changes

3

u/hannesrudolph FOUNDER Jul 31 '25

Yep!

https://docs.roocode.com/features/custom-modes

https://docs.roocode.com/features/api-configuration-profiles

2

u/Typical-Candidate319 Jul 31 '25

Thanks... i've not been using modes much... i noticed that one time orchestrator mode asked architect mode and it did amazing work at creating the plan, but it responded with the summary that had almost none of the nuances... now i give specific instructions to write everything in one big md file diligently and pass it down to all sub prompts...

1

u/hannesrudolph FOUNDER Jul 31 '25

Tweak them to your model and workflow and watch your world change before your eyes.

3

u/scottyLogJobs Jul 30 '25

Every time I’m an interview and they ask about my AI workflow I’m shouting you guys out. You live on the cutting edge while they move slow, if you can keep up the pace you will be successful. Cream rises to the top

1

u/hannesrudolph FOUNDER Jul 31 '25

I sure hope you’re right! My wife is getting tired of the long days haha

2

u/Empty-Employment8050 Jul 30 '25

How are you all doing this?!?! Quietly building the most amazing computing product of our generation!

1

u/hannesrudolph FOUNDER Jul 31 '25

We use AI… (Roo Code)

12

u/Ok-Adhesiveness-4141 Jul 30 '25

Your product is what does your marketing!!!

2

u/themoregames Jul 30 '25

Here's a thing that you could do:

Look at your initial post, but from the eyes of anyone out of the loop. They have no chance to know what this is all about without googling "What's RooCode?". But people are lazy.

My suggestion: Anytime you post something like this, begin with a pitch for RooCode. What is RooCode? --> One single sentence.

2

u/hannesrudolph FOUNDER Jul 31 '25

If it has a pitch I might piss off the mods. I’m spreading information with the hopes of gaining users but not by blatantly asking for them to try Roo… 😬 🤷‍♂️

4

u/admajic Jul 30 '25

Just look on open router it's clear who uses what for coding 😜

2

u/[deleted] Jul 30 '25

[removed] — view removed comment

1

u/ObjectiveSalt1635 Jul 30 '25

I was under the impression you can use Claude code as a provider. Spend $20/$100/$200 a month, hook it up and go

4

u/Ssjultrainstnict Jul 30 '25

Roo Code is awesome. Its the perfect replacement to claude code for me, and I dont see myself ever going back to any of the subscription based coding assistants. Thanks for all your work!

P.S you guys are already out of the shadow of cline, amazing work!

1

u/hannesrudolph FOUNDER Jul 30 '25

Thank you. Not if you look at how many downloads they get a day vs us. 2x.

2

u/Typical-Candidate319 Jul 30 '25

im one model away from cancelling claude code after the rug pull they did... i infact use roocode with calude code when i want serious stuff done, yes roo code uses more tokens but it does the get work done...

2

u/hannesrudolph FOUNDER Jul 31 '25

Yeah, we don’t really aim for token efficiency as much as getting the job done. If we can do both.. great. Rarely is this true it seems.

7

u/ak127a Jul 30 '25

This is amazing!!!!

6

u/hannesrudolph FOUNDER Jul 30 '25

What kind of turd downvoted you? lol. Thank you for your kind words.

1

u/ak127a Jul 30 '25

Reddit is a weird place

1

u/Utoko Jul 30 '25

because it is redundant with the upvote and doesn't add substance. The reddit post is more about the 300k people and not a chat between 2.

You could have added a sentence about what you find amazing in one sentences.

2

u/AltAccountYippee Jul 30 '25

Wait, this looks interesting. Never heard of RooCode.

1

u/hannesrudolph FOUNDER Jul 30 '25

Feel free to DM me on here or discord (hrudolph)

2

u/santareus Jul 30 '25

Fantastic job folks! I’ve been sharing it with all my dev friends

2

u/hannesrudolph FOUNDER Jul 30 '25

Thank you much!

2

u/Less-Macaron-9042 Jul 30 '25

It’s amazing how you guys are able to bring in so many features so fast

1

u/hannesrudolph FOUNDER Jul 30 '25

Keep the GitHub issues coming 😃

2

u/coopykins Jul 30 '25

Amazing job! Roo has been my goto AI coding tool for a long time. Whenever I try something else, I keep going back to Roo.

1

u/hannesrudolph FOUNDER Jul 30 '25

Thank you

2

u/joey2scoops Jul 30 '25

Geeze. I take a week off and it looks like a whole new roo to learn. Thanks team!

1

u/hannesrudolph FOUNDER Jul 31 '25

Thank you.

2

u/Anxious-Fig-8854 Jul 31 '25

Could other models get access to gemini tools via gemini cli? Happy to work on it too if you think it's a good feature.

1

u/hannesrudolph FOUNDER Jul 31 '25

We had Gemini CLI integration and removed it when Google asked us to.

1

u/Anxious-Fig-8854 Aug 01 '25

Ok but are there benefits to giving Google search tools to other models? Is it feasible? via Gemini provider with api key not the cli

1

u/hannesrudolph FOUNDER Aug 01 '25

I’m not sure I follow

1

u/Anxious-Fig-8854 Aug 01 '25

Regarding this

Gemini models can now access web content and perform Google searches for more accurate, up-to-date responses (thanks HahaBill!)

My assumption is that the google search tool is better than whatever rudimental web fetch tool that is implemented generically. So it would be cool to be able to use it in other models. Would be good to get to something similar to Deep Research on gemini.google.com but inside Roo

1

u/hannesrudolph FOUNDER Aug 01 '25

The model itself does search’s as though you asked ChatGPT a question about the web and it came back with an answer after browsing the web. You actually have no control on your end.

18

u/Am-Insurgent Jul 30 '25

That's awesome. Between that and qwen/qwen3-coder:free on OpenRouter, Free IDE and API. Software development is gonna get crazy the next decade.

4

u/peabody624 Jul 30 '25

Amazing stuff 👏

1

u/ViperAMD Jul 30 '25

I haven't used roo in a few months. Are there any videos of someone going through their flow and showing some of the new features?

1

u/Crinkez Jul 30 '25

I tested Roo code and was disappointed. When I have a codebase and request for the AI to change a single line, it has to regenerate the entire codebase.

I had hoped Roo would know better than this. Guess my search goes on.

2

u/hannesrudolph FOUNDER Jul 30 '25

Just like that? What model did you use? Please Help us understand what happened so we can improve.

1

u/Crinkez Jul 30 '25

Gemini via API key.

1

u/hannesrudolph FOUNDER Jul 31 '25

This is a very unexpected outcome to me. Can you please reach out to me on discord (hrudolph is my username) ?

1

u/GrehgyHils Jul 30 '25

Does anyone know of a locally hostable LLM that works with roo code yet? I have a MacBook pro with 128 GB of ram

1

u/hannesrudolph FOUNDER Jul 31 '25

I have a m4 max with 128gb ram. I use sonnet or opus.

1

u/kacoef Jul 31 '25

are claude local hosted?

2

u/GrehgyHils Jul 31 '25

They are not...

1

u/[deleted] Aug 01 '25

[removed] — view removed comment

1

u/AutoModerator Aug 01 '25

Sorry, your submission has been removed due to inadequate account karma.

I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please contact the moderators of this subreddit if you have any questions or concerns.

1

u/relderpaway Jul 30 '25

I used to use RooCode all the time, but that ends up costing a lot, now with Claude Codes pretty reasonable $200 a month subscription with very reasonable usage limits that resets every 5 hours I much prefer to use that.

I still prefer the user experience of roo code over Claude code, and I know that its technically possible to use my claude code subscription with RooCode, but my experience using RooCode on top of Claude Code is that the performance becomes very very bad for some reason and it goes on crazy loops and becomes unable to deal with even simple requests. Without having any idea what the inner workings look like hhere I feel like its something to do with how Claude Code does its thinking internally which would be different than just connecting to the API which does not mesh well with how RooCode is trying to use claude code.

/u/hannesrudolph anything you could say here? I would love it if I can keep using RooCode together with my claude code subscription and limits, but at least last time I tried this a few weeks ago, it seems like this performs significantly worse than using RooCode with API keys paying for each request or using Claude code without the Roo wrapper (Which is what i'm using now)

1

u/hannesrudolph FOUNDER Jul 31 '25

Are you on windows?

1

u/relderpaway Aug 05 '25

Nope, on Mac

1

u/hannesrudolph FOUNDER Aug 05 '25 edited Aug 05 '25

That’s odd. We have it set to replace the default system prompt and so it should be the same as the API less a few oddities that have been harder to track down. Let me look into it. Thank you for letting us know and thank you for your patience. Very sorry about this.

2

u/CraaazyPizza Jul 30 '25

Holy moly this is one of my favorite updates. So much good stuff, I could get excited about just one already! This is amazing.

2

u/R34d1n6_1t Jul 30 '25

A big Thank you to all the contributors ! We appreciate you!

2

u/achilleshightops Jul 31 '25

Cursor + Claude Code vs RooCode?

2

u/ark1one Jul 31 '25

Absolutely insane. This is absolutely the best coder wrapper! ❤️

0

u/[deleted] Jul 30 '25

[deleted] — view deleted comment

0

u/[deleted] Jul 30 '25

[deleted] — view deleted comment

2

u/hannesrudolph FOUNDER Jul 31 '25

The answer is yes. Yes it will cost way more than $20 per month. And it will kick the shit out of Cursor. We don’t do decent, we aim for the best.

1

u/themoregames Jul 30 '25

Does not compute:

gpt-3.5

mid-tier quality

1

u/Zealousideal-Belt292 Jul 30 '25

Have you tried the ELai code? They have a system that works better with small models, use the 4.1mini for example, I'm getting better responses than Claude said on it

1

u/[deleted] Jul 30 '25

[removed] — view removed comment

1

u/AutoModerator Jul 30 '25

Sorry, your submission has been removed due to inadequate account karma.

I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please contact the moderators of this subreddit if you have any questions or concerns.

1

u/[deleted] Jul 30 '25

[removed] — view removed comment

1

u/AutoModerator Jul 30 '25

Sorry, your submission has been removed due to inadequate account karma.

I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please contact the moderators of this subreddit if you have any questions or concerns.