Tabby – a Terminal for the Modern Age
Posted4 months agoActive4 months ago
github.comTechstory
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Terminal EmulatorsElectron AppsSoftware Performance
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Terminal Emulators
Electron Apps
Software Performance
The Tabby terminal emulator, formerly known as Terminus, is being discussed on HN, with users sharing their experiences and concerns about its performance, security, and design choices.
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Sep 17, 2025 at 3:00 AM EDT
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- Integrated SSH and Telnet client and connection manager
- Integrated serial terminal
- Theming and color schemes
- Fully configurable shortcuts and multi-chord shortcuts
- Split panes
- Remembers your tabs
- PowerShell (and PS Core), WSL, Git-Bash, Cygwin, MSYS2, Cmder and CMD support
- Direct file transfer from/to SSH sessions via Zmodem
- Full Unicode support including double-width characters
- Doesn't choke on fast-flowing outputs
- Proper shell experience on Windows including tab completion (via Clink)
- Integrated encrypted container for SSH secrets and configuration
- SSH, SFTP and Telnet client available as a web app (also self-hosted).
Honestly, ssh re-implemented "open source" in javascript goes beyond anti-feature and back around into "useful for security research".
Just needed these two reasons to not even try it out.
* Google Analytics on by default
* >100mb download
For a native terminal I'll happily use kitty or ghostty
For a SSH client Zoc (https://www.emtec.com/zoc/) hasn't disappointed me yet, and even then I almost just always ssh through my terminal.
When I got a Macbook last year, I did a "best terminal macos" search and evaluated multiple terminals; kitty, ghostty, iterm2 and wezterm.
settled on ghostty because it just felt faster for terminal refreshes when I use vite, had tabs, could easily theme it to use ayu-dark. Nothing too extreme, just personal reasons
iterm2 was fine as well, nothing special; wezterm and kitty just felt like linux apps that were on macos as well. YMMV.
I'll give iTerm2 another try, has many shiny features like touchID-sudo and such, otherwise don't understand what could possibly be better in ghostty/kitty
1. Remembering multiple hostnames and keys in a centralized location
I manage a fleet of VPSs, whose hostnames, credentials I don't always remember off the top of my head. Writing ssh -i <identity> <hostname> gets tedious when I'm wrangling multiple of them over a single session
2. Faithful terminal emulation
Zoc does a great job at emulating a plethora of terminals; it's not a do or die feature, but nice to have.
3. Separation of concerns
This is a personal reason, but I like having two different applications while I am doing something that needs me to SSH to multiple VPSs, my main terminal will have local commands, local file editing, etc while my SSH client will only be used for remote connections and management. Just helps me keep things tidy for myself.
Also as I mentioned in the parent I primarily use my main terminal to SSH; but for the cases mentioned it's nice to use a separate client.
There’s ssh_config(5) for that.
Instead I have some files elsewhere that I source into my terminal on start, containing:
export M4MINI=192.168.1.204
I wouldn't worry, but I also have the habit of adding things to the index explicitly. If I did worry: gitignore.
I'm also not sure why version control on ssh config should be a problem, unless previous poster confuses version control and "send everything to the cloud".
I don't understand, though, why you would not want to init a git repo in ~/ssh? What am I missing? It's not like "having version control" is the same as "upload it".
I know that is not something useful to everyone, but working in an embedded using serial ports is something I do everyday. And I know there is Putty or Kitty or Teraterm or another serial connection tools, but most of them are either only for Windows, and don't allow all the options that I need (e.g. option to enable local line editing with history).
The fact that it uses Electron... whatever, we are still full of Electron applications anyway, it's not an issue to me, I have enough RAM.
I've jet to find something replacement that either has all the features of tabby (including support for connecting to serial ports) I would be happy to switch.
There is little reason for SSH client to be integrated into a terminal emulator. Admittedly, my favorite kitty has a wrapper around OpenSSH, to fix terminfo and stuff, but it doesn't tries to re-implement the protocol. There is even less reason for serial port terminal to be a part of a terminal emulator - serial port terminal simply sets baudrate, remaps some control characters and gives you an escape key, it is not connected to rendering in any way.
That will be an unpopular opinion on this site, I know. Javascript is so slow, so bloated, and so far from the CPU that it is almost like building a railroad bridge using plastic. Could you build a railroad bridge out of plastic? yeah I'm sure that could be done. Is plastic the best material for this application? Not in the slightest. Javascript is not the right tool for anything outside of the browser, to me.
But, it's 2025 and plastic is everywhere, even inside our brains, so what do I know?
I tested all others (wezterm, ghostty, kitty, rio..) but this comfort trumps the speed or minimalism for me.
Just want a Warp without any AI. (Just checked and the main toggle was enabled, will try to disable it again)
Apparently this has nothing to do with the other terminus [0]?
[0]: https://gitlab.com/rastersoft/terminus
Just what I want in my terminal app.
I don't like the endless "security audit" noise, but there are 13 critical issues, some dating back 4 years, and including cryptogrpahy-related flaws (and that's just the top-level yarn.lock).
Right-click the terminal area and select "Settings". Then go to the "General" tab where there should be a setting for the color scheme.
[0]: https://gitlab.gnome.org/GNOME/console
Of course it's an Electron app... Sigh.
For Windows, Windows Terminal is pretty ok.
Tabby 2021, 107 comments https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29553767
Tabby 2023, 92 comments https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35111397
Tabby 2023, 72 comments https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36607323
I was trying to make ssh work on tabby when I realised it's just a glorified browser, I stopped in my tracks and purged the thing. I do enjoy the UX of moving around tabs and changing my mental contexts, but this is too much a price to pay. I don't mind download sizes as long as the application is performant, customizable, and don't have unnecessary backdoors.
If you're just using the terminal to run a few commands, and not working in it a lot, it's a pretty tool, and clearly built with a lot of love.