Alacritty vs WezTerm

Alacritty is a free, cross-platform terminal emulator for Linux, macOS, Windows, and BSD. It uses OpenGL and is designed for high performance and extensive configuration, for people who spend substantial time in a terminal. Vi mode supports viewport and scrollback navigation, text selection, and copying with keyboard bindings; users can also search forward or backward through scrollback. Configurable regex hints can recognize visible text or links and pass them to an external application or trigger a built-in action. One instance can run multiple terminal windows, including through the alacritty msg create-window command. Alacritty is designed to integrate with other applications rather than recreate their functions, and URL-opening applications can be configured. Settings use a TOML file that the software does not create automatically. The project describes Alacritty as beta, with missing features and bugs still to address. It has no tabs, split panes, or graphical configuration editor, and requires OpenGL ES 2.0. Windows use requires ConPTY support on Windows 10 version 1809 or higher.

WezTerm is a terminal emulator and multiplexer for Windows, macOS, and Linux, implemented in Rust. It organizes terminal panes, tabs, and windows across local and remote hosts, with mouse support and scrollback. Rendering features include ligatures, color emoji, font fallback, true color, and dynamic color schemes. Configuration is file-based and supports hot reloading. An embedded SSH client provides native tabs, and WezTerm can connect to remote multiplexer instances over SSH or TLS over TCP/IP. Ad-hoc SSH sessions are non-persistent: if the network connection is interrupted, their tabs end. It can also connect to serial ports for embedded and Arduino work. Shell integration supports escape sequences for working directories, prompt zones, and user variables; user variables can work through tmux when passthrough is enabled. Image support includes the iTerm2-compatible and Kitty graphics protocols, plus experimental Sixel graphics. Pre-built downloads are listed for Windows, macOS, Linux, FreeBSD, and NetBSD, and the code can be built from source. Windows requires 64-bit Windows 10.0.17763 or later. The MIT license permits use, modification, and distribution free of charge, with the software provided as-is without warranty.