Alternatives to Windows Terminal
Microsoft’s tabbed terminal for Windows, hosting Command Prompt, PowerShell and WSL in one GPU-rendered window. The listings below can replace it for an important use case. Each note says what changes if you switch.
The original
Windows Terminal
Microsoft’s tabbed terminal for Windows, hosting Command Prompt, PowerShell and WSL in one GPU-rendered window.
Replacements
Listings that take over the same core job as Windows Terminal.
WezTerm
A GPU-accelerated terminal that is also a multiplexer, configured in Lua and the same on every platform.
WezTerm is a GPU-accelerated terminal with built-in multiplexing and Lua configuration that also runs on macOS and Linux, maintained largely by one person.
ConEmu
Keep several Windows console sessions in a tabbed window.
ConEmu is a BSD-3-Clause tabbed Windows console host with configurable layouts for shells and console applications, predating Microsoft's own terminal.
Cmder
Carry a configured Windows console environment between machines.
Cmder bundles a Windows terminal interface with command-line enhancements in a portable setup you can carry between machines, under the MIT license.
Alacritty
A deliberately minimal OpenGL terminal that leaves multiplexing and tabs to other programs and just draws text fast.
Alacritty is a fast OpenGL terminal that also runs on macOS and Linux, but has no tabs or split panes, relying on tmux instead.
Tabby
A terminal, SSH client and serial console in one window, with a connection manager and an encrypted secret store.
Tabby is an Electron terminal that adds SSH, Telnet and serial connections plus an encrypted secret store, using more memory than a native terminal.
Hyper
A terminal built on web technologies, extended with JavaScript plugins and themed with CSS.
Hyper is an Electron terminal themed with CSS and extended with npm plugins, cross-platform but slower on heavy output and without releases since January 2023.
Warp
Rust terminal with block-based output, AI assistance and shared workflows.
Warp is a Rust terminal with command blocks and AI assistance on Windows, macOS and Linux, with hosted features needing a separate account and plan.
Contour Terminal
Run shell sessions in a GPU-rendered terminal emulator.
Contour Terminal is an Apache-2.0 GPU-rendered emulator with ligatures, Unicode and tabs that also runs on macOS and Linux.
Also worth comparing
These listings name Windows Terminal as their own alternative, so the relationship runs both ways.
Mintty
A terminal emulator for Cygwin, MSYS2 and WSL on Windows with thorough xterm compatibility.
Windows Terminal hosts Command Prompt, PowerShell and WSL in one GPU-rendered window with tabs and split panes, configured by editing JSON.
Rio
Use a configurable terminal emulator across desktop platforms.
Windows Terminal is Microsoft's MIT-licensed GPU terminal with tabs and split panes for cmd, PowerShell and WSL, limited to current Windows 10 and 11.
WSLtty
A Windows terminal for Windows Subsystem for Linux based on mintty and wslbridge2.
Windows Terminal hosts WSL, PowerShell and Command Prompt in one GPU-rendered window with tabs and split panes, which WSLtty does not have.
Similar software
Related functionality, not a direct replacement.
PuTTY
The small, stubbornly reliable SSH and Telnet client that has been on every Windows admin’s desktop for twenty-five years.
Clink
Add modern command editing to the Windows command prompt.
Nushell
Shell that pipes structured tables instead of untyped text.
Oh My Posh
Customize shell prompts across operating systems with configurable themes.
Starship
A shell prompt that shows the git branch, language version and other context, configured once and working in every shell.
Nerd Fonts
A collection of programming fonts patched with thousands of icons, plus a patcher for adding them to other fonts.
