Alternatives to TextMate
An open-source macOS text editor known for bundles, snippets, multiple carets and scoped settings. The listings below can replace it for an important use case. Each note says what changes if you switch.
The original
TextMate
An open-source macOS text editor known for bundles, snippets, multiple carets and scoped settings.
Replacements
Listings that take over the same core job as TextMate.
Sublime Text
A fast native editor for code and prose, paid for but with an evaluation that never stops working.
Sublime Text is cross-platform with similar multiple cursors and snippets, but it is paid, closed source and nags on save during evaluation.
BBEdit
A long-running macOS text and code editor for writers, web authors and software developers.
BBEdit is a long-running macOS editor with strong grep search and FTP and SFTP editing, closed source with some features behind a paid license.
Nova
A native macOS code editor and IDE from Panic with built-in terminals, Git and debugging.
Nova is a native macOS editor from Panic with built-in terminal, Git and debugging, but it is paid and requires macOS 15.6 or later.
Visual Studio Code
Microsoft's code editor, free to use but shipped under a Microsoft licence rather than an open one.
Visual Studio Code runs on Windows, macOS and Linux with a huge extension ecosystem, but it is Electron-based and not open source.
CotEditor
A free, open-source plain-text and code editor made for macOS.
CotEditor is a free, open-source native macOS editor with fast launch and regex find and replace, but without TextMate's bundle system.
CodeEdit
A lightweight, open-source code editor for macOS, built natively in Swift.
CodeEdit is a free, open-source native macOS editor written in Swift, but it is still in development at version 0.3.6.
Zed
A Rust editor from the people who built Atom, written for speed and for two people editing one file.
Zed is a fast native Rust editor with language servers, collaboration and AI features, available beyond macOS on Windows and Linux.
MacVim
A port of the Vim text editor that runs as a native macOS application.
MacVim brings Vim's modal editing to a native Mac window, working with existing Vim configuration but with a steep learning curve.
Also worth comparing
These listings name TextMate as their own alternative, so the relationship runs both ways.
CodeRunner
A lightweight macOS programming editor that runs and debugs code in many languages.
TextMate is a free open-source macOS editor with bundles, snippets and commands in any scripting language, but lacks CodeRunner's built-in breakpoint debugging and receives infrequent updates.
RubyMine
A JetBrains IDE for Ruby and Ruby on Rails with navigation, debugging and integrated tools.
TextMate is a free, open-source macOS editor with bundles and snippets, much lighter than RubyMine but without IDE debugging.
Similar software
Related functionality, not a direct replacement.
