Terminal text editors are everywhere in the Linux ecosystem. Vim and GNU Emacs are the most popular choices, while something like Nano is the go-to for many people (including me) for its easy-to-use nature.
Most of these require learning new keybindings or modal editing. The learning curve can be steep for beginners or casual users (like me).
Fresh is a new Rust-based terminal text editor that takes a different approach. It uses standard keybindings like Ctrl+S for saving, Ctrl+F for searching, and Ctrl+Z for undoing. It works like a GUI editor but runs in your terminal.
What’s so “Fresh” About This?
Fresh has full mouse support. You can click to place the cursor and drag to select text. The editor includes a command palette; just press Ctrl+P to search for any command.
If you press Ctrl+E, the built-in file explorer appears on the left side. You can navigate directories and open files with this, and the split-pane layout makes navigating easy.
LSP support is also provided, with features like go to definition, hover documentation, and diagnostics working without extra setup. Plus, Fresh can handle files over 10 GB, and it includes niceties like line numbers, word wrap, an embedded terminal, and a built-in markdown preview.
There is plugin support too; these use TypeScript and run in a sandboxed Deno environment.
A Quick Spin
I tested Fresh on Ubuntu 25.10, and it was nice. Editing files worked as expected. Standard shortcuts like Ctrl+S for saving and Ctrl+Z for undoing mistakes work without issues. Mouse navigation works well for interacting with the text and the interface.
The file manager was very responsive, appearing on the left side and letting me navigate directories quickly. The command palette was handy for searching specific commands, and the menu bar at the top has the usual options you’d see in a GUI text editor.
Quitting Fresh is easy with Ctrl+Q, and the pre-installed themes accessible via the command palette and the menu bar were good too. I liked the “Dark” one.
Freshen Up Your System
The aforementioned Dark theme on the left, the terminal installation method for Fresh on the right.
You can get Fresh for Debian, Ubuntu, and other derivatives by following these steps. First, download the latest .deb package from the releases page for your computer (the amd64 one if you aren’t on Arm).
Then, run the following command in the terminal to get it installed:
sudo dpkg -i fresh-editor_*.debAlternatively, you could double-click on the DEB file and get it installed through the App Center on Ubuntu. To launch the editor, run the fresh command.
You can find instructions for other Linux distributions and macOS on the official website. If you feel lost, then the documentation is a handy resource to have by your side.
Suggested Read đź“–: Best Text Editors for the Linux Command Line
