Ghostty vs Guake
Ghostty
ghostty.orgGuake
guake.github.ioSide by side
| Figure | Ghostty | Guake |
|---|---|---|
| Price from | Free | Free |
| Free plan | Yes | Yes |
| Free trial | — | — |
| Open source | — | — |
| macOS | Yes | — |
| Linux | Yes | Yes |
| Plans published | 1 | 1 |
| Spec score · Terminal Emulators | 8.3 (#11) | 8.1 (#19) |
| Spec score · Terminal apps | 8.2 (#13) | 7.6 (#36) |
| Free plan | Yes | Yes |
| Platforms | Ghostty runs on macOS and Linux; Windows support is planned for the future. | The project describes Guake as made for the GNOME desktop environment and lists installation instructions for Debian, Ubuntu, Fedora, Arch Linux, and Manjaro. |
| Product | Ghostty is a fast, feature-rich, native terminal emulator. | Guake is a multilingual, top-down terminal for GNOME, inspired by the terminal used in Quake. |
| Scripting API | Yes | Yes |
| Split panes | Yes | Yes |
| Support | Ghostty has no support team or dedicated support resources; help is community-provided through GitHub Discussions and Discord. | The homepage directs users to the GitHub Issues page to report bugs and welcomes code and translation contributions. |
| Supported platforms | macOS,Linux | linux |
Plans
In their own words
Ghostty
Ghostty is a free, open-source terminal emulator for macOS and Linux. It renders with Metal on macOS and OpenGL on Linux for GPU acceleration, while native interface components provide multiple windows, tabs, and split panes. Its shared libghostty core handles terminal emulation, fonts, and rendering through a cross-platform C ABI. Ghostty includes hundreds of themes and can follow system light and dark modes automatically. It supports the Kitty graphics protocol for terminal images and provides automatic shell integration for bash, elvish, fish, nushell, and zsh. SSH integration can forward environment variables and install Ghostty terminfo entries on remote hosts. macOS Secure Keyboard Entry helps protect passwords from other processes, and official macOS binaries are signed and notarized. Ghostty is licensed under MIT and fiscally sponsored by Hack Club, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit. Community help is available through GitHub Discussions and Discord; there is no dedicated support team. The Ghostty plan is free, described as free and open source with no commercial backing.