VSCodium
Visual Studio Code built from the same source without Microsoft’s branding, telemetry or licence.
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4 more ways to get VSCodium
Package managers
- winget
winget install --id VSCodium.VSCodium - Chocolatey
choco install vscodium - Homebrew
brew install --cask vscodium - Flathub
flatpak install flathub com.vscodium.codium
About VSCodium
Microsoft’s vscode repository is MIT licensed, but the Visual Studio Code product Microsoft ships is built from it with a proprietary licence, telemetry and Microsoft-specific endpoints added. VSCodium runs the build scripts on the same source and publishes the result: the editor you know, freely licensed and with telemetry disabled by default.
It is not a fork. The project exists so you do not have to clone and build the repository yourself. Extensions come from the Open VSX registry rather than Microsoft’s marketplace, which is the one practical difference most people notice.
Strengths
- The same editor as VS Code, built from the same MIT-licensed source without Microsoft branding
- Telemetry is disabled in the default configuration
- Packages for Windows, macOS and Linux, plus Homebrew, WinGet, Chocolatey, Scoop, snap and Flatpak
- Community-driven default configuration rather than a vendor product build
Limitations
- Extensions come from Open VSX, so a few marketplace-only extensions are missing
- Microsoft’s proprietary extensions, including the C# debugger and Remote Development, are not licensed for it
- Releases follow upstream VS Code, so they arrive slightly later
Details
- Pricing
- FreeFree and open source under the MIT licence.
- License
- MIT
- Developer
- The VSCodium community
- Platforms
- Windows, macOS, Linux
- How it runs
- Downloadable app
- Account
- Not required
- Works offline
- Yes
- Best suited for
- VS Code without Microsoft telemetry or licensing
- Categories
- Code editors
- Last verified
- Added
- Provenance
- Selected from the TechWalrus downloads catalog (Editors); facts checked against the developer's own pages, 4 sources on file.
Alternatives to VSCodium
Compare allSoftware that can replace VSCodium for an important use case, and what changes if you switch.
Visual Studio Code
Microsoft's code editor, free to use but shipped under a Microsoft licence rather than an open one.
Visual Studio Code gives access to Microsoft's marketplace and proprietary extensions like Remote Development, but ships under a Microsoft licence and collects telemetry by default.
code-server
Use a VS Code-based workspace through your browser.
code-server runs a VS Code-based workspace through a browser on a host you control, MIT-licensed, rather than as a desktop application.
Zed
A Rust editor from the people who built Atom, written for speed and for two people editing one file.
Zed is an open source native Rust editor with collaboration and built-in language servers, with a smaller extension ecosystem than VSCodium's Open VSX.
Lapce
A code editor written in Rust with GPU rendering, built-in LSP support, optional modal editing and remote development.
Lapce is an Apache-2.0 native Rust editor with built-in LSP and remote development, but still pre-1.0 with a small plugin ecosystem.
Pulsar
Community-maintained continuation of the Atom text editor.
Pulsar is an MIT-licensed community continuation of Atom with its own package registry, also Electron-based, with a smaller maintainer team.
Cursor
An AI code editor built on VS Code, with coding agents that plan and carry out tasks.
Cursor is built on VS Code with AI agents built in, but it is closed source, relies on hosted models and charges for heavier use.
Neovim
A modern rewrite of Vim with a built-in language server client, Lua configuration and an embeddable API.
Neovim is an Apache-2.0 terminal editor with a built-in LSP client and Lua plugins, trading a graphical interface for modal editing.
VSCodium as an alternative
Listings that name VSCodium as an alternative.
CLion
C and C++ IDE with CMake integration and deep static analysis.
VSCodium is an MIT-licensed VS Code build without telemetry, though Microsoft's proprietary extensions are not licensed for it and extensions come from Open VSX.
Eclipse IDE
Long-established open-source IDE with a very large plugin marketplace.
VSCodium offers the VS Code editor under the MIT license with telemetry disabled, drawing extensions from Open VSX instead of Eclipse's plugin marketplace.
Geany
A small, fast IDE built on GTK that starts instantly and does not depend on a heavy desktop environment.
VSCodium gives the VS Code editor under MIT without telemetry, with far more language tooling than Geany but a heavier Electron runtime.
GNU Emacs
An editor that is really a Lisp environment, extensible to the point where people run their email, calendar and shell inside it.
VSCodium is an MIT-licensed VS Code build without telemetry, offering extension-driven customisation instead of runtime Emacs Lisp extensibility.
GoLand
Go IDE with completion, refactoring and an integrated debugger.
VSCodium is an MIT-licensed VS Code build without telemetry, relying on Open VSX extensions for Go support instead of a paid IDE subscription.
IntelliJ IDEA
Java and Kotlin IDE with deep code analysis and refactoring.
VSCodium is an MIT-licensed VS Code build without telemetry, lighter than IntelliJ, but with extension-based rather than built-in Java analysis.
Kate
KDE's text editor: syntax highlighting for over 400 languages, split views, multi-cursor editing and an embedded terminal.
VSCodium is the MIT-licensed VS Code build without telemetry, with broader extension coverage than Kate and no KDE Frameworks dependency.
Lite XL
Edit text and code in a lightweight Lua-based editor.
VSCodium is an MIT-licensed VS Code build without telemetry, with a larger extension ecosystem but a heavier Electron runtime.
Notepad++
The fast Windows text and source code editor that replaced Notepad for a generation of users.
VSCodium is an MIT-licensed VS Code build without telemetry, cross-platform and extension-rich, but heavier than Notepad++.
PyCharm
Python IDE with debugging, testing, scientific tools and web framework support.
VSCodium offers the VS Code editing experience under an MIT licence without telemetry, with Python support coming from Open VSX extensions rather than built-in IDE tooling.
Rider
Cross-platform .NET IDE combining ReSharper analysis with a full IDE.
VSCodium is open source and telemetry-free, but Microsoft's proprietary C# debugger is not licensed for it, which limits .NET debugging compared with Rider.
Sublime Text
A fast native editor for code and prose, paid for but with an evaluation that never stops working.
VSCodium is a free MIT-licensed build of VS Code without telemetry, trading Sublime Text's native speed for a much larger Open VSX extension catalogue.
WebStorm
JavaScript and TypeScript IDE with first-class framework support.
VSCodium is an MIT-licensed, telemetry-free VS Code build, with JavaScript tooling from Open VSX extensions instead of WebStorm's built-in framework support.
Similar software
Related functionality, not necessarily a direct replacement.
Windows Terminal
Microsoft’s tabbed terminal for Windows, hosting Command Prompt, PowerShell and WSL in one GPU-rendered window.
WezTerm
A GPU-accelerated terminal that is also a multiplexer, configured in Lua and the same on every platform.
GitHub Copilot
An AI coding assistant from GitHub that suggests code and carries out coding tasks in editors and terminals.
