Software Alternatives & Reviews

Xmonad VS yabai

Compare Xmonad VS yabai and see what are their differences

Xmonad logo Xmonad

xmonad is a dynamically tiling X11 window manager that is written and configured in Haskell.

yabai logo yabai

A tiling window manager for macOS based on binary space partitioning
  • Xmonad Landing page
    Landing page //
    2022-04-01
  • yabai Landing page
    Landing page //
    2023-07-26

Xmonad videos

Xmonad Review

More videos:

  • Review - Hacking on Xmonad - GridSelect, ToggleStruts, ToggleBorders
  • Review - Obscure Window Manager Project - Xmonad

yabai videos

Yabai Demonstration

More videos:

  • Demo - yabai macOS Tiling Window Manager Demonstration

Category Popularity

0-100% (relative to Xmonad and yabai)
Window Manager
32 32%
68% 68
Linux
100 100%
0% 0
OSX Tools
0 0%
100% 100
Utilities
100 100%
0% 0

User comments

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Reviews

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

Xmonad Reviews

Top 13 Best Tiling Window Managers For Linux In 2022
XMonad is a dynamic tiling X11 window manager that allows you to automate window finding and alignment. It may be customised with its own extension library, which includes choices for status bars and window decorations. It’s also simple to set up, stable, and minimal.
Source: www.hubtech.org
13 Best Tiling Window Managers for Linux
spectrwm is a small, dynamic, xmonad, and dwm-inspired reparenting and tiling window manager built for X11 to be fast, compact, and concise. It was created with the aim of solving the issues of xmonad and dwm face.
Source: www.tecmint.com
5 Great Tiling Window Managers for Linux
Xmonad is a tiling window manager written in Haskell. Like most (if not all) window managers, it comes with no frills or window decorations. The keyboard shortcuts are top notch. It works out-of-the-box and is very user friendly. On top of all that, Xmonad sports a fairly big extension library (which can add on even more functionality).

yabai Reviews

We have no reviews of yabai yet.
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Social recommendations and mentions

Based on our record, yabai should be more popular than Xmonad. It has been mentiond 132 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.

Xmonad mentions (14)

  • [Media] shrs: a shell that is configurable and extensible in rust
    Hey everyone 👋 ! I'm currently working on a rust library for building and configuring your own shell! It's inspired by projects like xmonad and penrose where the configuration of the program is done in code. This means that for example, instead of using Bash's arcane syntax for configuring the prompt, it can be configured instead using a rust builder pattern! The project itself is still at a very young stage, so... Source: about 1 year ago
  • What LaTeX setup do you use?
    There are a few other things I could mention, but there are more like side issues, and not relevant to my actual LaTeX setup. First and foremost—and thus perhaps noteworthy after all—is bibliography management with arxiv-citation (see here for more words). This is integrated very well with the XMonad window manager, which makes it even more of a joy to use. Source: about 1 year ago
  • How to map arrows keys to CapsLock+(h,i,j,k) shortcuts in i3
    Another way to do it (and works on Linux and other platforms) is with XMonad, defining Caps Lock as a layer key. Source: almost 2 years ago
  • Can ISTP like abstract things and theories?
    I tried it once, it was alright. https://xmonad.org/ But I prefer to build my own. Source: almost 2 years ago
  • What exactly is a tiling window manager?
    Here is another tiling wm with screenshots: Https://xmonad.org/. Source: almost 2 years ago
View more

yabai mentions (132)

  • Ask HN: Best Hacks for a Ultrawide Monitor?
    I have a 49 inch CRG9 and the best recommendation for window management is Yabai (https://github.com/koekeishiya/yabai). Yabai is a greedy window management solution that tries to fit opened applications in given space and skhd let's you easily jump between those using keyboard shortcuts. This has massively improved my ultrawide experience. Only disclaimer is, configuring yabai has a slight learning curve. - Source: Hacker News / 3 months ago
  • Is there an app that does this Windows feature?
    Want something free that's better than tiling on Windows? Yabai. Source: 5 months ago
  • macOS Containers v0.0.1
    SIP is a feature that protects you from malicious actors with root (admin) access on your device. After they've encrypted your photos and drives and changed your passwords, it prevents them from making your machine unbootable by deleting or altering system binaries. As a side effect of this protection, you give up certain freedoms to customize your system. - Source: Hacker News / 7 months ago
  • Ask HN: Why does Apple refuse to add window snapping to macOS?
    This is disproven by the fact that Yabai [1] can instantly swap spaces with SIP disabled. [1] https://github.com/koekeishiya/yabai. - Source: Hacker News / 11 months ago
  • Ask HN: Why does Apple refuse to add window snapping to macOS?
    I feel the same way. I would much prefer no animation at all, and an instant transition to another space. Apparently this is possible with [yabai](https://github.com/koekeishiya/yabai), but it requires disabling system integrity protection which I am personally uncomfortable with. - Source: Hacker News / 11 months ago
View more

What are some alternatives?

When comparing Xmonad and yabai, you can also consider the following products

i3 - A dynamic tiling window manager designed for X11, inspired by wmii, and written in C.

Rectangle - Window management app based on Spectacle, written in Swift.

dwm - dwm is a dynamic window manager for X. It manages windows in tiled, monocle and floating layouts. All of the layouts can be applied dynamically, optimising the environment for the application in use and the task performed.

Magnet Window Manager - Magnet Developers

awesome - A dynamic window manager for the X Window System developed in the C and Lua programming languages.

Moom - Move your mouse over the green zoom button in any window, and Moom's mouse control overlay will appear (as seen in the above animation).