Best Text Editors 2026

Textadept suits programmers who want a scriptable editor with graphical or terminal access.

EditiX is a free text editor for Windows, macOS, and Linux with large-file support.

TeXworks is a free cross-platform TeX, LaTeX, and ConTeXt editor with a synced PDF viewer.

Pulsar suits developers and other text-editing users who want an open-source desktop editor with packages, language server support, and Git tools.

Lite XL is a free, extensible text editor for Windows, Linux and macOS.

Fresh suits developers who want IDE-style features while working in a terminal.

Micro suits people who prefer terminal-based editing, including those who regularly edit files over SSH.

TextMate is a macOS text editor with extensions, multi-cursor editing, and a 30-day trial.

Froala Editor is a paid web, iOS, and Android editor with extensions and a 30-day trial.

Mousepad suits Linux users who want to edit text files quickly without a development environment or extensive plugin collection.

GNOME Text Editor is a free Linux desktop app for editing text files.

PSPad is a free Windows editor with add-on support.