This is a list of notable

terminal emulator A terminal emulator, or terminal application, is a computer program that emulates a video terminal within some other display architecture. Though typically synonymous with a shell or text terminal, the term ''terminal'' covers all remote ter ...

s. Most used terminal emulators on Linux and Unix-like systems are

GNOME Terminal GNOME Terminal is a terminal emulator for the GNOME desktop environment written by Havoc Pennington and others. Terminal emulators allow users to access a UNIX shell while remaining on their graphical desktop. Features GNOME Terminal (gnome-ter ...

on GNOME and GTK-based environments,

Konsole Konsole is a free and open-source terminal emulator graphical application which is part of KDE Applications and ships with the KDE desktop environment. Konsole was originally written by Lars Doelle. It ls licensed under the GPL-2.0-or-later and ...

KDE KDE is an international free software community that develops free and open-source software. As a central development hub, it provides tools and resources that allow collaborative work on this kind of software. Well-known products include the ...

, and xfce4-terminal on Xfce as well as

xterm In computing, xterm is the standard terminal emulator for the X Window System. It allows users to run programs which require a command-line interface. If no particular program is specified, xterm runs the user's shell. An X display can sho ...

Character-oriented terminal emulators

Unix-like

Command-line interface

Linux console The Linux console is a system console internal to the Linux kernel. A system console is the device which receives all kernel messages and warnings and which allows logins in single user mode. The Linux console provides a way for the kernel and ...

– implements a subset of the VT102 and ECMA-48/ISO 6429/ANSI X3.64

escape sequences In computer science, an escape sequence is a combination of characters that has a meaning other than the literal characters contained therein; it is marked by one or more preceding (and possibly terminating) characters. Examples * In C and man ...

. The following terminal emulators run inside of other terminals, utilizing libraries such as

Curses A curse (also called an imprecation, malediction, execration, malison, anathema, or commination) is any expressed wish that some form of adversity or misfortune will befall or attach to one or more persons, a place, or an object. In particular, ...

and

Termcap Termcap (''terminal capability'') is a software library and database used on Unix-like computers. It enables programs to use display computer terminals in a device-independent manner, which greatly simplifies the process of writing portable text m ...

: *

GNU Screen GNU Screen is a terminal multiplexer, a software application that can be used to multiplex several virtual consoles, allowing a user to access multiple separate login sessions inside a single terminal window, or detach and reattach sessions fro ...

– Terminal multiplexer with VT100/ANSI terminal emulation *

Minicom Minicom is a text-based modem control and terminal emulator program for Unix-like operating systems, originally written by Miquel van Smoorenburg, and modeled somewhat after the popular MS-DOS program Telix but is open source. Minicom inclu ...

– text-based modem control and terminal emulation program for Unix-like operating systems *

tmux tmux is an open-source terminal multiplexer for Unix-like operating systems. It allows multiple terminal sessions to be accessed simultaneously in a single window. It is useful for running more than one command-line program at the same ti ...

– Terminal multiplexer with a feature set similar to GNU Screen

Graphical

=X11 and Wayland

= Terminal emulators used in combination with

X Window System The X Window System (X11, or simply X) is a windowing system for bitmap displays, common on Unix-like operating systems. X provides the basic framework for a GUI environment: drawing and moving windows on the display device and interacting ...

and Wayland: *

Alacritty Alacritty is a free and open-source GPU-accelerated terminal emulator focused on performance and simplicity. Consequently, it does not support tabs or splits and is configured by editing a text file. It is written in Rust and uses OpenGL (for pe ...

– GPU accelerated, without tabs *

– default terminal for GNOME with native Wayland support *

guake This is a list of notable applications that use GTK and/or Clutter for their GUI widgets. Such applications blend well with desktop environments that are GTK-based as well, such as GNOME, Cinnamon, LXDE, MATE, Pantheon, Sugar, Xfce or ROX Desktop ...

– drop-down terminal for GNOME * kitty – GPU accelerated, with tabs, tiling, image viewing, interactive unicode character input *

konsole Konsole is a free and open-source terminal emulator graphical application which is part of KDE Applications and ships with the KDE desktop environment. Konsole was originally written by Lars Doelle. It ls licensed under the GPL-2.0-or-later and ...

– default terminal for

rxvt Rxvt (acronym for our extended virtual terminal) is a terminal emulator for the X Window System, and in the form of a Cygwin port, for Windows. History Rxvt was originally written by Rob Nation and later extensively modified by Mark Olesen, who ...

– lightweight X11 terminal emulator :* aterm (from rxvt 2.4.8) created for use with the AfterStep window manager (no longer maintained) :* Eterm (from rxvt 2.21) created for use with Enlightenment :*

mrxvt The mrxvt program is a terminal emulator for X Window System. It provides DEC VT102 compatible terminals. mrxvt is based on rxvt version 2.7.11 CVS (in 2004), and features most of functionality of rxvt. Unlike rxvt, it provides multiple tabs. ...

(from rxvt 2.7.11) created for multiple tabs and additional features (latest version released in 2008-09-10) :* urxvt (from rxvt 2.7.11) created to support

Unicode Unicode, formally The Unicode Standard,The formal version reference is is an information technology standard for the consistent encoding, representation, and handling of text expressed in most of the world's writing systems. The standard, ...

, also known as rxvt-unicode :* Wterm – created for

NeXTSTEP NeXTSTEP is a discontinued object-oriented, multitasking operating system based on the Mach kernel and the UNIX-derived BSD. It was developed by NeXT Computer in the late 1980s and early 1990s and was initially used for its range of proprieta ...

style

window manager A window manager is system software that controls the placement and appearance of windows within a windowing system in a graphical user interface. Most window managers are designed to help provide a desktop environment. They work in conjunct ...

s such as

Window Maker Window Maker is a free and open-source window manager for the X Window System, allowing graphical applications to be run on Unix-like operating-systems. It is designed to emulate NeXTSTEP's GUI as an OpenStep-compatible environment. Window Maker ...

Terminator Terminator may refer to: Science and technology Genetics * Terminator (genetics), the end of a gene for transcription * Terminator technology, proposed methods for restricting the use of genetically modified plants by causing second generation s ...

– written in Java with many novel or experimental features * Tilda – a drop-down terminal * Tilix – GTK3 tiling terminal emulator * xfce4-terminal – default terminal for Xfce with drop-down support *

– standard terminal for X11 *

Yakuake The KDE Gear (also known as the KDE Applications Bundle or KDE Applications) is a set of applications and supporting libraries that are developed by the KDE community, primarily used on Linux-based operating systems but mostly multiplatform, and ...

– (Yet Another Kuake) a drop-down terminal for

= macOS

= Terminal emulators used on

macOS macOS (; previously OS X and originally Mac OS X) is a Unix operating system developed and marketed by Apple Inc. since 2001. It is the primary operating system for Apple's Mac (computer), Mac computers. Within the market of ...

iTerm2 iTerm2 is a terminal emulator for macOS, licensed under GPL-2.0-or-later. It was derived from and has mostly supplanted the earlier "iTerm" application. iTerm2 supports operating system features such as window transparency, full-screen mode, s ...

– open-source terminal specifically for macOS * kitty – GPU accelerated, with tabs, tiling, image viewing, interactive unicode character input * MacWise *

SecureCRT SecureCRT is a commercial SSH and Telnet client and terminal emulator by VanDyke Software. Originally a Windows product, VanDyke later added a Mac OS X version in 2010 with release v6.6 and a Linux version in 2011 with release v6.7. History Secur ...

Terminal Terminal may refer to: Computing Hardware * Terminal (electronics), a device for joining electrical circuits together * Terminal (telecommunication), a device communicating over a line * Computer terminal, a set of primary input and output devic ...

– default macOS terminal *

– default terminal when X11.app starts * ZOC * ZTerm – serial line terminal

Apple Classic Mac OS

* MacTerminal *

Red Ryder Red is the color at the long wavelength end of the visible spectrum of light, next to orange and opposite violet. It has a dominant wavelength of approximately 625–740 nanometres. It is a primary color in the RGB color model and a seconda ...

* ZTerm

Android

* Termux

Microsoft Windows

* AbsoluteTelnet *

* AlphaCom * ConEmu – local terminal window that can host console application developed either for WinAPI (cmd, powershell, far) or Unix PTY (cygwin, msys, wsl bash) *

HyperACCESS HyperACCESS (sometimes known as HyperTerminal) is a family of terminal emulation software by Hilgraeve. A version of HyperACCESS called HyperTerminal is included in some versions of Windows. History It was the first software product from Hilg ...

(commercial) and HyperTerminal (included free with Windows XP and earlier, but not included with Windows Vista and later) *

Kermit 95 Kermit is a computer file transfer/management protocol and a set of communications software tools primarily used in the early years of personal computing in the 1980s. It provides a consistent approach to file transfer, terminal emulation, scrip ...

mintty mintty is a free and open source terminal emulator for Cygwin, the Unix-like environment for Windows. It features a native Windows user interface and does not require a display server; its terminal emulation is aimed to be compatible with xt ...

–

Cygwin Cygwin ( ) is a POSIX-compatible programming and runtime environment that runs natively on Microsoft Windows. Under Cygwin, source code designed for Unix-like operating systems may be compiled with minimal modification and executed. The Cygwin i ...

terminal *

Procomm Plus Datastorm Technologies, Inc., was a computer software company that existed from 1986 until 1996. Bruce Barkelew and Thomas Smith founded the company to develop and publish ProComm, a general purpose communications program for personal computers. ...

PuTTY Putty is a material with high plasticity, similar in texture to clay or dough, typically used in domestic construction and repair as a sealant or filler. Although some types of putty (typically those using linseed oil) slowly polymerise and be ...

* Qmodem Pro *

RUMBA The term rumba may refer to a variety of unrelated music styles. Originally, "rumba" was used as a synonym for "party" in northern Cuba, and by the late 19th century it was used to denote the complex of secular music styles known as Cuban rumba. ...

* Tera Term *

TtyEmulator TtyEmulator is a Freeware terminal emulator application which can act as a client for the SSH, Telnet, rlogin, and raw TCP computing protocols and as a serial console client. TtyEmulator is written for Microsoft Windows, but it will be por ...

Windows Console Windows Console is the infrastructure for console applications in Microsoft Windows. An instance of a Windows Console has a screen buffer and an input buffer. It allows console apps to run inside a window or in hardware text mode (so as to occ ...

– Windows command line terminal *

Windows Terminal Windows Terminal is a Tabbed, multi-tabbed terminal emulator that Microsoft has developed for Windows 10 and later as a replacement for Windows Console. It can run any command-line app in a separate tab. It is preconfigured to run Windows Comma ...

* ZOC

MS-DOS

Crosstalk In electronics, crosstalk is any phenomenon by which a signal transmitted on one circuit or channel of a transmission system creates an undesired effect in another circuit or channel. Crosstalk is usually caused by undesired capacitive, in ...

* Kermit *

ProComm Datastorm Technologies, Inc., was a computer software company that existed from 1986 until 1996. Bruce Barkelew and Thomas Smith founded the company to develop and publish ProComm, a general purpose communications program for personal computers. ...

Qmodem Qmodem was an MS-DOS shareware telecommunications program and terminal emulator. Qmodem was widely used to access bulletin boards in the 1980s and was well respected in the Bulletin Board System community. Qmodem was also known as Qmodem SST and ...

and Qmodem Pro *

Synchronet Synchronet is a multiplatform BBS software package, with current ports for Microsoft Windows, Linux, and BSD variants. Past versions also ran on MS-DOS and OS/2, but support for those platforms were dropped in version 3.0 (circa 2000). Histo ...

Telix Telix is a telecommunications program originally written for DOS by Colin Sampaleanu and released in 1986. On October 10, 1988 in the release note for Telix 3.10, Sampaleanu announced the creation of 'Exis Inc.'; name used to develop the softwar ...

* Terminate

IBM OS/2

* ZOC – discontinued support for OS/2

Amiga

* NComm

Commodore 64

CBterm/C64 CBterm/C64, commonly referred to as CBterm, is a terminal emulator for the Commodore 64, authored by Christopher "Chrisdos" Dunn. CBterm bears a copyright date of 1985; version 5.0 of the software was released in early 1987 and is coded entirely ...

Block-oriented terminal emulators

Emulators for

block-oriented terminal A computer terminal is an electronic or electromechanical hardware device that can be used for entering data into, and transcribing data from, a computer or a computing system. The teletype was an example of an early-day hard-copy terminal an ...

s, primarily

IBM 3270 The IBM 3270 is a family of block oriented display and printer computer terminals introduced by IBM in 1971 and normally used to communicate with IBM mainframes. The 3270 was the successor to the IBM 2260 display terminal. Due to the text ...

, but also

IBM 5250 IBM 5250 is a family of block-oriented terminals originally introduced with the IBM System/34 midrange computer systems in 1977. It also connects to the later System/36, System/38, and IBM AS/400 systems, and to IBM Power Systems systems runn ...

and other non-IBM terminals.

Coax/Twinax connected

These terminal emulators are used to replace terminals attached to a host or terminal controller via a

coaxial cable Coaxial cable, or coax (pronounced ) is a type of electrical cable consisting of an inner conductor surrounded by a concentric conducting shield, with the two separated by a dielectric ( insulating material); many coaxial cables also have a ...

(coax) or

twinaxial cabling Twinaxial cabling, or "Twinax", is a type of cable similar to coaxial cable, but with two inner conductors instead of one. Due to cost efficiency it is becoming common in modern (2013) very-short-range high-speed differential signaling application ...

(twinax). They require that the computer on which they run have a hardware adapter to support such an attachment. *

3270 and 5250

tn3270/tn5250

These terminal emulators connect to a host using the tn3270 or

tn5250 IBM 5250 is a family of block-oriented terminals originally introduced with the IBM System/34 midrange computer systems in 1977. It also connects to the later System/36, System/38, and IBM AS/400 systems, and to IBM Power Systems systems running I ...

protocols, which run over a

Transmission Control Protocol The Transmission Control Protocol (TCP) is one of the main protocols of the Internet protocol suite. It originated in the initial network implementation in which it complemented the Internet Protocol (IP). Therefore, the entire suite is common ...

(TCP) connection. * Eicon Aviva * IBM Personal Communications * Rocket BlueZone *

TN3270 Plus TN3270 Plus is a terminal emulator for Microsoft Windows. It is used for connecting Windows PC users to IBM mainframe, IBM i and UNIX systems via TCP/IP. TN3270 Plus includes terminal emulation for 3270, 5250, VT100, VT220 and ANSI terminals. T ...

* Tn5250j * x3270 – open-source, multi-platform, TN3270 client * ZOC

References

External links

Linux console escape and control sequences

List of X11 terminals available on Gentoo Linux

List of X11 terminals available on archlinux

Guide to Windows terminals

The Grumpy Editor's guide to terminal emulators
2004
Comprehensive Linux Terminal Performance Comparison
2007
x11-terminals
{{Terminal emulator * Emulators, Terminal