Software Alternatives & Reviews

xterm VS iTerm2

Compare xterm VS iTerm2 and see what are their differences

xterm logo xterm

You can download and use MobaXterm Home Edition for free.

iTerm2 logo iTerm2

A terminal emulator for macOS that does amazing things.
  • xterm Landing page
    Landing page //
    2023-03-17
  • iTerm2 Landing page
    Landing page //
    2018-10-29

xterm videos

No xterm videos yet. You could help us improve this page by suggesting one.

+ Add video

iTerm2 videos

Customizing iterm2 with ZSH and PowerLevel9k | Z shell Tutorial

Category Popularity

0-100% (relative to xterm and iTerm2)
SSH
15 15%
85% 85
Server Management
11 11%
89% 89
Development
100 100%
0% 0
Developer Tools
0 0%
100% 100

User comments

Share your experience with using xterm and iTerm2. For example, how are they different and which one is better?
Log in or Post with

Reviews

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

xterm Reviews

The 10 Best Linux Terminal Emulators
XTERM is the default emulator for the X window system. XTERM is a good choice for minimal Linux installations. Its minimalist approach makes it a good choice among many Linux users.
Top 14 Terminal Emulators for Linux (With Extra Features or Amazing Looks)
XTERM is one of the most popular terminal emulators out there. Even though it might seem to be a bloated option when compared to st, it’s still a decent option that you can try for X Window System.
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 seems to be a lot more popular than xterm. While we know about 98 links to iTerm2, we've tracked only 4 mentions of xterm. 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.

xterm mentions (4)

  • CVE-2022-45063: Xterm
    -- For a better overview, see http://invisible-island.net/xterm/. - Source: Hacker News / over 1 year ago
  • A good python library to replace libtcod for terminal play?
    Iterm2, gnome terminal, xterm, Konsole, macos Terminal, powershell, command, etc.. these all provide a common API which we normally use curses to interface with. But all of them basically reach into something lower level (opengl, vulkan, directx, etc.) to render the text, which ultimately is still pixels on a screen. Source: over 2 years ago
  • Convert terminal output to Images
    Xterm has had the ability to make HTML or SVG dumps of the screen since 2016 (patch 323). Source: almost 3 years ago
  • What terminal emulator do you use?
    Xterm — Simple terminal emulator for the X Window System. It provides DEC VT102 and Tektronix 4014 compatible terminals for programs that cannot use the window system directly https://invisible-island.net/xterm/. Source: about 3 years ago

iTerm2 mentions (98)

  • Ask HN: What software sparks joy when using?
    In no particular order: Prologue [0] - iOS Audiobook player, used Plex as a media source Overcast [1] - iOS Podcast player CleanShotX [2] - macOS screenshot/video/gif capture with annotation Drafts [3] - iOS/macOS note taking tool Paprika [4] - Cross platform recipe app YNAB [5] - "You Need A Budget" - web/mobile budgeting app 1Password [6] - Cross platform password manager Carrot Weather [7] - iOS weather app... - Source: Hacker News / 16 days ago
  • Terminal commands I use as a frontend developer
    I am using iTerm2 on my macOS. Other available options are Hyper and VS Code’s inbuilt terminal, which I sometimes use for quick tests. You can open a terminal in VS Code by using the keyboard shortcut CMD + J or CTRL + J on Windows, or View → Terminal. - Source: dev.to / about 2 months ago
  • I Just Wanted Emacs to Look Nice – Using 24-Bit Color in Terminals
    IME, this is like the golden age of terminal apps in general and macOS-compatible ones in particular. There are several really good terminals for macOS: [iTerm2 app](https://iterm2.com/) [Kitty terminal](https://sw.kovidgoyal.net/kitty/) [WezTerm terminal](https://wezfurlong.org/wezterm/index.html) [Alacritty](https://github.com/alacritty/alacritty) -... - Source: Hacker News / 3 months ago
  • My MacBook Setup For Development 2024
    Over the past few years, my coding journeys have been accompanied by the reliable iTerm2, offering a seamless experience without any fuss. It seemed like I had everything I needed until I came across Warp. Exploring this innovative terminal emulator over the past few weeks has been a delightful revelation, bringing a fresh perspective and exciting features to my development environment. Website link. - Source: dev.to / 4 months ago
  • Pimp your CLI
    A decent terminal application (i.e: iterm2, alacritty, etc.). - Source: dev.to / 5 months ago
View more

What are some alternatives?

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

Konsole - Konsole is a free terminal emulator which is part of KDE Software Compilation.

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

GNOME Terminal - GNOME Terminal is a terminal emulator for GNOME desktop.

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

Gnome Terminator - Terminator is one of the most useful and dynamic terminal emulators for Unix based operating systems.

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