Software Alternatives, Accelerators & Startups

Xfce VS iTerm2

Compare Xfce VS iTerm2 and see what are their differences

Xfce logo Xfce

Xfce is a lightweight desktop environment for UNIX-like operating systems. It aims to be fast and low on system resources, while still being visually appealing and user friendly.

iTerm2 logo iTerm2

A terminal emulator for macOS that does amazing things.
  • Xfce Landing page
    Landing page //
    2023-07-04
  • iTerm2 Landing page
    Landing page //
    2018-10-29

Xfce videos

Fully functional? - Xfce 4.14 First Impressions

More videos:

  • Review - Debian 10 XFCE Review
  • Review - Xfce Desktop Overview

iTerm2 videos

Customizing iterm2 with ZSH and PowerLevel9k | Z shell Tutorial

Category Popularity

0-100% (relative to Xfce and iTerm2)
Linux
100 100%
0% 0
SSH
0 0%
100% 100
Operating Systems
100 100%
0% 0
Server Management
0 0%
100% 100

User comments

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Reviews

These are some of the external sources and on-site user reviews we've used to compare Xfce and iTerm2

Xfce Reviews

9 Best Linux Desktop Environments to Use in 2023
XFCE is compatible with a wide range of Linux distros. Xfce does not offer sophisticated modifications, yet it is the most performance-oriented desktop environment. It’s a compact desktop environment with a comprehensive user interface. XFCE can be installed on a variety of UNIX systems. It has been reported to compile on Ubuntu, NetBSD, Solaris, Cygwin, OpenBSD, and macOS...
Source: geekflare.com
The 8 Best Ubuntu Desktop Environments (22.04 Jammy Jellyfish Linux)
Cinnamon desktop is another fork of the GNOME desktop. It has a rather conservative design and is similar to Xfce. It is uncomplicated to learn and from this reason might be a good choice for someone who is new to Linux.
Source: linuxconfig.org
Top 10 Best Desktop Environments in 2020
Lightweight and Low-resource can be considered the same, but in this case, there’s a difference. XFCE is a lightweight desktop environment even with a whole lot of built-in customizations and UI perks. LXDE, on the other hand, is a DE that is built to be as low-resource as possible. You certainly can add animations, but they need to be downloaded separately.
The 12 Best Linux Desktop Environments
At first look, Xfce looks a bit older and boring, but we assure you that your mindset will change after unpacking it because it is one of the best Linux lightweight desktop environments available. Xfce is becoming one of the most reliable choices, but it has a comparatively small team for development that results in late updates. Nowadays, many users think that Xfce is an...
Source: linuxhint.com
The Best Desktop Environments For Linux (We Tested Them So That You Don’t Have To)
Xfce is light on resources but proves to provide a feature-rich user experience. If you need a performance-centric desktop environment without needing advanced customizations, Xfce is a great choice to go with.
Source: itsfoss.com

iTerm2 Reviews

  1. Useful

    I've had so many problems with terminal in my Mac.. thanks for this tool. It's like really useful

    👍 Pros:    Fast|Convenience|Fastest, safest, and cheapest
    👎 Cons:    None

MobaXterm for Mac: Best Alternatives to MobaXterm for Mac
You can choose a Hotkey and register it as a shortcut to open the iTerm2. When you are using other application, just press the Hotkey and it will bring iTerm (terminal) to the foreground of your screen. So the iTerm2 is the best alternative to MobaXterm for Mac which will be always available for you.
30 best PuTTY alternatives for SSH clients for 2020
The iTerm2 system is available for Macs. Specifically, the program can run on Mac OS 10.10 and higher. This interface shows different terminal sessions through a split screen method, allowing you to tile sessions side by side. To lessen confusion, the active panel shows in full resolution, while the others dimmed. You can set up keyboard shortcuts to navigate through the...

Social recommendations and mentions

Based on our record, iTerm2 should be more popular than Xfce. It has been mentiond 105 times since March 2021. We are tracking product recommendations and mentions on various public social media platforms and blogs. They can help you identify which product is more popular and what people think of it.

Xfce mentions (19)

  • distro hopping
    Pick up your Desktop Environment based on your computer's specs, NOT on your visual preferences. (HINT: XFCE consumes way less system resources than GNOME and KDE). Source: 7 months ago
  • Lightweight dev tools.
    It’s a bit of an interesting challenge and has forced me to re-examine some of my tool usage. I started by a minimal install of Debian “bookworm” with the XFCE Desktop Environment which chews through much fewer resources than the default GNOME 43 based environment (although more than LXDE - but there still has to be room for aesthetics). - Source: dev.to / 10 months ago
  • I Still Use Windows 95 (archived, 2008)
    Luckily you can get an efficient, clean Desktop Environment that works well and is actively developed: Xfce ( https://xfce.org/ ) I think you will like it. It has a very early-2000's feel IMO. - Source: Hacker News / about 1 year ago
  • best lightweight linux distro for old laptop and gaming
    Well, it depends. It was better experience than FreeBSD 7.2 that's for sure. :) It was running Xorg with https://i3wm.org, a web-server, XMPP-server, PostgreSQL, few bots and dovecot / postfix (e-mail server). It was doing fine routing internet for 2PCs and a WiFi router for 10 years until its HDD died. For gaming... erm... I was able to play something like Theme Hospital or Syndicate Wars in dosbox. You have to... Source: about 1 year ago
  • Only one of the four XFCE4's desktop/workspace got hung and now I can't use wallpaper
    Another resource for help might be xfce.org. It's a low traffic site, but responsive. Source: about 1 year ago
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iTerm2 mentions (105)

  • Ask HN: What macOS apps/programs do you use daily and recommend?
    iTerm2[2] and I'm astonished there's less mention of it on this thread (though there is some). That is mainly because I switched mostly to Linux a few years ago, and you'd think the lack of a good terminal app wouldn't be the biggest pain point of switching from Mac to Linux, but it absolutely is. There's no terminal app on Linux even close to as good as iTerm2. [2]: https://iterm2.com/ but it's v3 tho... - Source: Hacker News / 7 days ago
  • Ask HN: What macOS apps/programs do you use daily and recommend?
    * Homebrew - Package manager (kinda like apt/rpm on Linux). * Secretive - Stores SSH keys in the secure enclave [https://github.com/maxgoedjen/secretive] * Hazel - File automations [https://www.noodlesoft.com/] * Arq - Excellent backup software for local and/or remote backups [https://arqbackup.com/] * ChronoSync - File synchronization on steoroids [https://www.econtechnologies.com/chronosync/overview.html] *... - Source: Hacker News / 7 days ago
  • Ask HN: What macOS apps/programs do you use daily and recommend?
    Alfred - Productivity App for macOS [1] iTerm2 - macOS Terminal Replacement [2] Dropshare App - upload anything anywhere on macOS [3] Mimestream - A native macOS email client for Gmail [4] Things - To-Do List for Mac & iOS [5] [1] https://www.alfredapp.com [2] https://iterm2.com [3] https://dropshare.app [4] https://mimestream.com [5] https://culturedcode.com/things. - Source: Hacker News / 7 days ago
  • Leveraging Wasp for full-stack development
    A modern terminal shell such as zsh, iTerm2 with oh-my-zsh for Mac, or Hyper for Windows. - Source: dev.to / 13 days ago
  • Ditch Your Boring Terminal and Make it More Useful
    Iterm2 is a terminal emulator for macOS. It’s kind of a replacement for your original terminal. It comes with a bunch of cool features and customizations that we will go over later. - Source: dev.to / about 1 month ago
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What are some alternatives?

When comparing Xfce and iTerm2, you can also consider the following products

KDE Plasma Desktop - Plasma Workspaces is the umbrella term for all graphical environments provided by KDE.

MobaXterm - Enhanced terminal for Windows with X11 server, tabbed SSH client, network tools and much more

LXQt - The LXQt team is proud to announce the release of qtermwidget and qterminal, both in version 0. 8. 0. Read more..

PuTTY - Popular free terminal application. Mostly used as an SSH client.

LXDE - Why will you like it? Less resource needs. You can use it on your less-pricey embedded board or salvaged computer. Component-based design. Don't want something in LXDE, or you don't want to use LXDE but only part of it?

KiTTY - KiTTY is a fork from version 0.70 of PuTTY. It adds extra features to PuTTY.