GNOME Text Editor vs Lapce
GNOME Text Editor
apps.gnome.org
Lapce
lap.devSide by side
| Figure | GNOME Text Editor | Lapce |
|---|---|---|
| Price from | Free | Free |
| Free plan | Yes | Yes |
| Free trial | — | — |
| Open source | — | Yes |
| Windows | — | Yes |
| macOS | — | Yes |
| Linux | Yes | Yes |
| Plans published | 1 | 2 |
| Spec score · Text Editors | 7.5 (#68) | 8.8 (#8) |
| Spec score · Code editors | 7.1 (#44) | 8.2 (#23) |
| Architecture | Flathub lists x86_64 and aarch64 as available architectures. | The frontend, filesystem access, plugins and language servers communicate through lapce-proxy, which also runs on remote machines. |
| Maker | The GNOME Project says it was founded in 1997 by Miguel de Icaza and Federico Mena. | The About page says Lapdev is maintained by the Lapce team and describes Lapce and Floem as open source projects. |
| Syntax highlighting | The app page shows a syntax highlighting interface. | Tree-sitter provides syntax highlighting, with Rust, JSON and TOML grammars included and other grammars loaded externally. |
Plans
In their own words
GNOME Text Editor
GNOME Text Editor has no write-up on Specifiction yet; its figures are above.
Lapce
Lapce is an open-source code editor written in Rust, available for Linux, macOS, and Windows. It uses a native graphical interface with GPU acceleration through Floem. For code intelligence, it combines Tree-sitter syntax highlighting with Language Server Protocol support for completion, diagnostics, and code actions. Developers can connect to a remote machine to work in an environment matching a production server, and the included terminal opens at the workspace path. The editor has built-in Vim-like modal editing and supports multiple cursors. Plugins can be written in any programming language that compiles to WASI, and the editor supports extensions. Downloads include Linux tar.gz builds for x86 and ARM, Windows system installer and portable x86 builds, and a universal macOS DMG. The product page displays version 0.4.2. Its documentation covers setup, settings, keybindings, modal editing, remote development, themes, terminal use, multiple cursors, syntax highlighting, and plugin development. The About page says Lapdev is maintained by the Lapce team and describes Lapce and Floem as open-source projects.