Alternatives to Atom logo

Alternatives to Atom

Sublime Text, Visual Studio Code, Brackets, cell, and Element are the most popular alternatives and competitors to Atom.
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What is Atom and what are its top alternatives?

At GitHub, we're building the text editor we've always wanted. A tool you can customize to do anything, but also use productively on the first day without ever touching a config file. Atom is modern, approachable, and hackable to the core. We can't wait to see what you build with it.
Atom is a tool in the Text Editor category of a tech stack.
Atom is an open source tool with 60K GitHub stars and 17.4K GitHub forks. Here’s a link to Atom's open source repository on GitHub

Top Alternatives to Atom

  • Sublime Text
    Sublime Text

    Sublime Text is available for OS X, Windows and Linux. One license is all you need to use Sublime Text on every computer you own, no matter what operating system it uses. Sublime Text uses a custom UI toolkit, optimized for speed and beauty, while taking advantage of native functionality on each platform. ...

  • Visual Studio Code
    Visual Studio Code

    Build and debug modern web and cloud applications. Code is free and available on your favorite platform - Linux, Mac OSX, and Windows. ...

  • Brackets
    Brackets

    With focused visual tools and preprocessor support, it is a modern text editor that makes it easy to design in the browser. ...

  • cell
    cell

    cell is a self-constructing web app framework powered by a self-driving DOM. Learning cell is mostly about understanding how cell works, and not about how to use and memorize some API methods, because there is no API. ...

  • Element
    Element

    Element is a Vue 2.0 based component library for developers, designers and product managers, with a set of design resources. ...

  • PyCharm
    PyCharm

    PyCharm’s smart code editor provides first-class support for Python, JavaScript, CoffeeScript, TypeScript, CSS, popular template languages and more. Take advantage of language-aware code completion, error detection, and on-the-fly code fixes! ...

  • Vim
    Vim

    Vim is an advanced text editor that seeks to provide the power of the de-facto Unix editor 'Vi', with a more complete feature set. Vim is a highly configurable text editor built to enable efficient text editing. It is an improved version of the vi editor distributed with most UNIX systems. Vim is distributed free as charityware. ...

  • Notepad++
    Notepad++

    Notepad++ is a free (as in "free speech" and also as in "free beer") source code editor and Notepad replacement that supports several languages. Running in the MS Windows environment, its use is governed by GPL License. ...

Atom alternatives & related posts

Sublime Text logo

Sublime Text

33.1K
27.2K
4K
A sophisticated text editor for code, markup and prose.
33.1K
27.2K
+ 1
4K
PROS OF SUBLIME TEXT
  • 720
    Lightweight
  • 652
    Plugins
  • 641
    Super fast
  • 468
    Great code editor
  • 442
    Cross platform
  • 280
    Nice UI
  • 260
    Unlimited trial
  • 153
    Cmd + d is the best command ever
  • 92
    Great community
  • 46
    Package control, modules
  • 26
    Mac OS X support
  • 23
    Easy to get started with
  • 22
    Monokai
  • 21
    Everything you need without the bloat
  • 21
    Built in Python
  • 18
    Easy
  • 14
    Speed
  • 12
    Session & edit resuming
  • 10
    Package Control
  • 9
    Well Designed
  • 8
    Multiple selections
  • 7
    ALT + CMD + DOWN is the best command ever
  • 7
    Nice
  • 7
    Fast, simple and lightweight
  • 5
    It's easy to use, beautiful, simple, and plugins rule
  • 5
    So futuristic and convenient
  • 5
    ALT + F3 the best command ever
  • 5
    Great
  • 4
    Find anything fast within entire project
  • 4
    Easy to use
  • 4
    Free
  • 4
    Simple and clean design
  • 3
    Hackable
  • 3
    Pretty
  • 3
    UI + plugins
  • 3
    Sublime Merge (Git Integration)
  • 2
    Totally customizable
  • 2
    Color schemes and cmd+d
  • 2
    Material theme best theme forever
  • 0
    Const
CONS OF SUBLIME TEXT
  • 8
    Steep learning curve
  • 6
    Everything
  • 4
    Flexibility to move file
  • 4
    Number of plugins doing the same thing
  • 4
    Doesn't act like a Mac app
  • 3
    Not open sourced
  • 2
    Don't have flutter integration
  • 2
    Forces you to buy license

related Sublime Text posts

Johnny Bell

I've been in the #frontend game for about 7 years now. I started coding in Sublime Text because all of the tutorials I was doing back then everyone was using it. I found the speed amazing compared to some other tools at the time. I kept using Sublime Text for about 4-5 years.

I find Sublime Text lacks some functionality, after all it is just a text editor rather than a full fledged IDE. I finally converted over to PhpStorm as I was working with Magento and Magento as you know is mainly #PHP based.

This was amazing all the features in PhpStorm I loved, the debugging features, and the control click feature when you click on a dependency or linked file it will take you to that file. It was great.

PhpStorm is kind of slow, I found that Prettier was taking a long time to format my code, and it just was lagging a lot so I was looking for alternatives. After watching some more tutorial videos I noticed that everyone was using Visual Studio Code. So I gave it a go, and its amazing.

It has support for everything I need with the plugins and the integration with Git is amazing. The speed of this IDE is blazing fast, and I wouldn't go back to using PhpStorm anymore. I highly recommend giving Visual Studio Code a try!

See more
Labinator Team

At labinator.com, we use HTML5, CSS 3, Sass, Vanilla.JS and PHP when building our premium WordPress themes and plugins. When writing our codes, we use Sublime Text and Visual Studio Code depending on the project. We run Manjaro and Debian operating systems in our office. Manjaro is a great desktop operating system for all range of tasks while Debian is a solid choice for servers.

WordPress became a very popular choice when it comes to content management systems and building websites. It is easy to learn and has a great community behind it. The high number of plugins as well that are available for WordPress allows any user to customize it depending on his/her needs.

For development, HTML5 with Sass is our go-to choice when building our themes.

Main Advantages Of Sass:

  • It's CSS syntax friendly
  • It offers variables
  • It uses a nested syntax
  • It includes mixins
  • Great community and online support.
  • Great documentation that is easy to read and follow.

As for PHP, we always thrive to use PHP 7.3+. After the introduction of PHP 7, the WordPress development process became more stable and reliable than before. If you a developer considering PHP 7.3+ for your project, it would be good to note the following benefits.

The Benefits Of Using PHP:

  • Open Source.
  • Highly Extendible.
  • Easy to learn and read.
  • Platform independent.
  • Compatible with APACHE.
  • Low development and maintenance cost.
  • Great community and support.
  • Detailed documentation that has everything you need!

Why PHP 7.3+?

  • Flexible Heredoc & Nowdoc Syntaxes - Two key methods for defining strings within PHP. They also became easier to read and more reliable.
  • A good boost in performance speed which is extremely important when it comes to WordPress development.
See more
Visual Studio Code logo

Visual Studio Code

173.5K
158K
2.3K
Build and debug modern web and cloud applications, by Microsoft
173.5K
158K
+ 1
2.3K
PROS OF VISUAL STUDIO CODE
  • 340
    Powerful multilanguage IDE
  • 308
    Fast
  • 193
    Front-end develop out of the box
  • 158
    Support TypeScript IntelliSense
  • 142
    Very basic but free
  • 126
    Git integration
  • 106
    Intellisense
  • 78
    Faster than Atom
  • 53
    Better ui, easy plugins, and nice git integration
  • 45
    Great Refactoring Tools
  • 44
    Good Plugins
  • 42
    Terminal
  • 38
    Superb markdown support
  • 36
    Open Source
  • 34
    Extensions
  • 26
    Large & up-to-date extension community
  • 26
    Awesome UI
  • 24
    Powerful and fast
  • 22
    Portable
  • 18
    Best editor
  • 18
    Best code editor
  • 17
    Easy to get started with
  • 15
    Lots of extensions
  • 15
    Built on Electron
  • 15
    Crossplatform
  • 15
    Good for begginers
  • 14
    Extensions for everything
  • 14
    Open, cross-platform, fast, monthly updates
  • 14
    All Languages Support
  • 13
    Easy to use and learn
  • 12
    Extensible
  • 12
    "fast, stable & easy to use"
  • 11
    Totally customizable
  • 11
    Git out of the box
  • 11
    Faster edit for slow computer
  • 11
    Ui design is great
  • 11
    Useful for begginer
  • 10
    Great community
  • 10
    SSH support
  • 10
    Fast Startup
  • 9
    It has terminal and there are lots of shortcuts in it
  • 9
    Powerful Debugger
  • 9
    Great language support
  • 9
    Works With Almost EveryThing You Need
  • 8
    Python extension is fast
  • 8
    Can compile and run .py files
  • 7
    Great document formater
  • 7
    Features rich
  • 6
    He is not Michael
  • 6
    Awesome multi cursor support
  • 6
    Extension Echosystem
  • 6
    She is not Rachel
  • 5
    Language server client
  • 5
    Easy azure
  • 5
    SFTP Workspace
  • 5
    VSCode.pro Course makes it easy to learn
  • 5
    Very proffesional
  • 4
    Supports lots of operating systems
  • 4
    Has better support and more extentions for debugging
  • 4
    Excellent as git difftool and mergetool
  • 4
    Virtualenv integration
  • 3
    Has more than enough languages for any developer
  • 3
    Better autocompletes than Atom
  • 3
    Emmet preinstalled
  • 3
    'batteries included'
  • 3
    More tools to integrate with vs
  • 2
    VS Code Server: Browser version of VS Code
  • 2
    Big extension marketplace
  • 2
    Customizable
  • 2
    Microsoft
  • 2
    Light
  • 2
    Fast and ruby is built right in
  • 2
    CMake support with autocomplete
CONS OF VISUAL STUDIO CODE
  • 46
    Slow startup
  • 29
    Resource hog at times
  • 20
    Poor refactoring
  • 13
    Poor UI Designer
  • 11
    Weak Ui design tools
  • 10
    Poor autocomplete
  • 8
    Super Slow
  • 8
    Huge cpu usage with few installed extension
  • 8
    Microsoft sends telemetry data
  • 7
    Poor in PHP
  • 6
    It's MicroSoft
  • 3
    Poor in Python
  • 3
    No Built in Browser Preview
  • 3
    No color Intergrator
  • 3
    Very basic for java development and buggy at times
  • 3
    No built in live Preview
  • 3
    Electron
  • 2
    Bad Plugin Architecture
  • 2
    Powered by Electron
  • 1
    Terminal does not identify path vars sometimes
  • 1
    Slow C++ Language Server

related Visual Studio Code posts

Simon Reymann
Senior Fullstack Developer at QUANTUSflow Software GmbH · | 30 upvotes · 8.9M views

Our whole DevOps stack consists of the following tools:

  • GitHub (incl. GitHub Pages/Markdown for Documentation, GettingStarted and HowTo's) for collaborative review and code management tool
  • Respectively Git as revision control system
  • SourceTree as Git GUI
  • Visual Studio Code as IDE
  • CircleCI for continuous integration (automatize development process)
  • Prettier / TSLint / ESLint as code linter
  • SonarQube as quality gate
  • Docker as container management (incl. Docker Compose for multi-container application management)
  • VirtualBox for operating system simulation tests
  • Kubernetes as cluster management for docker containers
  • Heroku for deploying in test environments
  • nginx as web server (preferably used as facade server in production environment)
  • SSLMate (using OpenSSL) for certificate management
  • Amazon EC2 (incl. Amazon S3) for deploying in stage (production-like) and production environments
  • PostgreSQL as preferred database system
  • Redis as preferred in-memory database/store (great for caching)

The main reason we have chosen Kubernetes over Docker Swarm is related to the following artifacts:

  • Key features: Easy and flexible installation, Clear dashboard, Great scaling operations, Monitoring is an integral part, Great load balancing concepts, Monitors the condition and ensures compensation in the event of failure.
  • Applications: An application can be deployed using a combination of pods, deployments, and services (or micro-services).
  • Functionality: Kubernetes as a complex installation and setup process, but it not as limited as Docker Swarm.
  • Monitoring: It supports multiple versions of logging and monitoring when the services are deployed within the cluster (Elasticsearch/Kibana (ELK), Heapster/Grafana, Sysdig cloud integration).
  • Scalability: All-in-one framework for distributed systems.
  • Other Benefits: Kubernetes is backed by the Cloud Native Computing Foundation (CNCF), huge community among container orchestration tools, it is an open source and modular tool that works with any OS.
See more
Johnny Bell

I've been in the #frontend game for about 7 years now. I started coding in Sublime Text because all of the tutorials I was doing back then everyone was using it. I found the speed amazing compared to some other tools at the time. I kept using Sublime Text for about 4-5 years.

I find Sublime Text lacks some functionality, after all it is just a text editor rather than a full fledged IDE. I finally converted over to PhpStorm as I was working with Magento and Magento as you know is mainly #PHP based.

This was amazing all the features in PhpStorm I loved, the debugging features, and the control click feature when you click on a dependency or linked file it will take you to that file. It was great.

PhpStorm is kind of slow, I found that Prettier was taking a long time to format my code, and it just was lagging a lot so I was looking for alternatives. After watching some more tutorial videos I noticed that everyone was using Visual Studio Code. So I gave it a go, and its amazing.

It has support for everything I need with the plugins and the integration with Git is amazing. The speed of this IDE is blazing fast, and I wouldn't go back to using PhpStorm anymore. I highly recommend giving Visual Studio Code a try!

See more
Brackets logo

Brackets

443
748
202
A modern, open source text editor that understands web design
443
748
+ 1
202
PROS OF BRACKETS
  • 51
    Beautiful UI
  • 40
    Lightweight
  • 25
    Extremely customizable
  • 20
    Free plugins
  • 14
    Live Preview
  • 13
    Free themes
  • 8
    Clean
  • 7
    Easy
  • 6
    Integration with photoshop
  • 4
    Perfect for web development
  • 4
    Simple
  • 4
    Fast
  • 2
    Awesome UI
  • 2
    Clean UI
  • 2
    Code suggestions
CONS OF BRACKETS
  • 3
    Not good for backend developer
  • 1
    You have to edit json file to set your settings.
  • 1
    Bad node.js support

related Brackets posts

Chidumebi Ifemena
UI/UX Designer, Web Developer · | 2 upvotes · 87.6K views

For a beginner developer, what tool is most suitable for coding, Brackets or Visual Studio Code?

I am having some issues doing some inline CSS coding using Vscode but it is possible with Brackets. Polls have it saying Vscode is the most suitable for web development, so which is the best?

See more
cell logo

cell

13
21
3
A self-driving web app framework
13
21
+ 1
3
PROS OF CELL
  • 1
    Just curious
  • 1
    Straightforward usage
  • 1
    Interesting principles
CONS OF CELL
    Be the first to leave a con

    related cell posts

    Element logo

    Element

    81
    92
    3
    A Vue 2.0-based desktop UI library for developers, designers and PMs
    81
    92
    + 1
    3
    PROS OF ELEMENT
    • 3
      Very complete solution
    CONS OF ELEMENT
    • 2
      Buggy in parts

    related Element posts

    PyCharm logo

    PyCharm

    27.3K
    23.2K
    451
    The Most Intelligent Python IDE
    27.3K
    23.2K
    + 1
    451
    PROS OF PYCHARM
    • 112
      Smart auto-completion
    • 93
      Intelligent code analysis
    • 77
      Powerful refactoring
    • 60
      Virtualenv integration
    • 54
      Git integration
    • 22
      Support for Django
    • 11
      Multi-database integration
    • 7
      VIM integration
    • 4
      Vagrant integration
    • 3
      In-tool Bash and Python shell
    • 2
      Plugin architecture
    • 2
      Docker
    • 1
      Django Implemented
    • 1
      Debug mode support docker
    • 1
      Emacs keybinds
    • 1
      Perforce integration
    CONS OF PYCHARM
    • 10
      Slow startup
    • 7
      Not very flexible
    • 6
      Resource hog
    • 3
      Periodic slow menu response
    • 1
      Pricey for full features

    related PyCharm posts

    christy craemer

    UPDATE: Thanks for the great response. I am going to start with VSCode based on the open source and free version that will allow me to grow into other languages, but not cost me a license ..yet.

    I have been working with software development for 12 years, but I am just beginning my journey to learn to code. I am starting with Python following the suggestion of some of my coworkers. They are split between Eclipse and IntelliJ IDEA for IDEs that they use and PyCharm is new to me. Which IDE would you suggest for a beginner that will allow expansion to Java, JavaScript, and eventually AngularJS and possibly mobile applications?

    See more

    I am a QA heading to a new company where they all generally use Visual Studio Code, my experience is with IntelliJ IDEA and PyCharm. The language they use is JavaScript and so I will be writing my test framework in javaScript so the devs can more easily write tests without context switching.

    My 2 questions: Does VS Code have Cucumber Plugins allowing me to write behave tests? And more importantly, does VS Code have the same refactoring tools that IntelliJ IDEA has? I love that I have easy access to a range of tools that allow me to refactor and simplify my code, making code writing really easy.

    See more
    Vim logo

    Vim

    26.9K
    21.8K
    2.4K
    Highly configurable text editor built to enable efficient text editing
    26.9K
    21.8K
    + 1
    2.4K
    PROS OF VIM
    • 347
      Comes by default in most unix systems (remote editing)
    • 328
      Fast
    • 312
      Highly configurable
    • 297
      Less mouse dependence
    • 247
      Lightweight
    • 145
      Speed
    • 100
      Plugins
    • 97
      Hardcore
    • 82
      It's for pros
    • 65
      Vertically split windows
    • 30
      Open-source
    • 25
      Modal editing
    • 22
      No remembering shortcuts, instead "talks" to the editor
    • 21
      It stood the Test of Time
    • 16
      Unicode
    • 13
      VimPlugins
    • 13
      Everything is on the keyboard
    • 13
      Stick with terminal
    • 12
      Dotfiles
    • 11
      Flexible Indenting
    • 10
      Hands stay on the keyboard
    • 10
      Efficient and powerful
    • 10
      Programmable
    • 9
      Everywhere
    • 9
      Large number of Shortcuts
    • 8
      A chainsaw for text editing
    • 8
      Unmatched productivity
    • 7
      Developer speed
    • 7
      Super fast
    • 7
      Makes you a true bearded developer
    • 7
      Because its not Emacs
    • 7
      Modal editing changes everything
    • 6
      You cannot exit
    • 6
      Themes
    • 5
      EasyMotion
    • 5
      Most and most powerful plugins of any editor
    • 5
      Shell escapes and shell imports :!<command> and !!cmd
    • 5
      Intergrated into most editors
    • 5
      Shortcuts
    • 5
      Great on large text files
    • 5
      Habit
    • 5
      Plugin manager options. Vim-plug, Pathogen, etc
    • 4
      Intuitive, once mastered
    • 4
      Perfect command line editor
    • 1
      Not MicroSoft
    CONS OF VIM
    • 8
      Ugly UI
    • 5
      Hard to learn

    related Vim posts

    Denys
    Software engineer at Typeform · | 13 upvotes · 1.7M views
    • Go because it's easy and simple, facilitates collaboration , and also it's fast, scalable, powerful.
    • Visual Studio Code because it has one of the most sophisticated Go language support plugins.
    • Vim because it's Vim
    • Git because it's Git
    • Docker and Docker Compose because it's quick and easy to have reproducible builds/tests with them
    • Arch Linux because Docker for Mac/Win is a disaster for the human nervous system, and Arch is the coolest Linux distro so far
    • Stack Overflow because of Copy-Paste Driven Development
    • JavaScript and Python when a something needs to be coded for yesterday
    • PhpStorm because it saves me like 300 "Ctrl+F" key strokes a minute
    • cURL because terminal all the way
    See more
    Jerome Dalbert
    Principal Backend Software Engineer at StackShare · | 13 upvotes · 893.6K views

    I liked Sublime Text for its speed, simplicity and keyboard shortcuts which synergize well when working on scripting languages like Ruby and JavaScript. I extended the editor with custom Python scripts that improved keyboard navigability such as autofocusing the sidebar when no files are open, or changing tab closing behavior.

    But customization can only get you so far, and there were little things that I still had to use the mouse for, such as scrolling, repositioning lines on the screen, selecting the line number of a failing test stack trace from a separate plugin pane, etc. After 3 years of wearily moving my arm and hand to perform the same repetitive tasks, I decided to switch to Vim for 3 reasons:

    • your fingers literally don’t ever need to leave the keyboard home row (I had to remap the escape key though)
    • it is a reliable tool that has been around for more than 30 years and will still be around for the next 30 years
    • I wanted to "look like a hacker" by doing everything inside my terminal and by becoming a better Unix citizen

    The learning curve is very steep and it took me a year to master it, but investing time to be truly comfortable with my #TextEditor was more than worth it. To me, Vim comes close to being the perfect editor and I probably won’t need to switch ever again. It feels good to ignore new editors that come out every few years, like Atom and Visual Studio Code.

    See more
    Notepad++ logo

    Notepad++

    19.8K
    16.4K
    417
    Free source code editor and Notepad replacement
    19.8K
    16.4K
    + 1
    417
    PROS OF NOTEPAD++
    • 103
      Syntax for all languages that i use
    • 59
      Tabbed ui
    • 56
      Great code editor
    • 53
      Fast and lightweight
    • 38
      Plugins
    • 28
      Nice GUI
    • 26
      Regex & Special Character Search & Replace
    • 16
      Fast startup
    • 9
      Application is free, and plugins are too
    • 9
      Themes
    • 6
      Free
    • 4
      Very Lightweight
    • 3
      100% Free
    • 2
      Column selection
    • 1
      Awesome autocomplete
    • 1
      Easy edit on FTP servers (NppFTP)
    • 1
      Cos it's seck
    • 1
      Nice gui. are you kidding me?
    • 1
      Open Sourced
    CONS OF NOTEPAD++
    • 3
      No default plugin manager
    • 2
      Can't install more advanced packets

    related Notepad++ posts

    Hey there, I am using Visual Studio for C++ and Notepad++ for web development. Should I switch to Visual Studio or Visual Studio Code for web development?

    See more
    Gustavo Muñoz
    Senior Software Engineer at JOOR · | 3 upvotes · 313.9K views

    I have chosen Visual Studio Code after testing a lot of other editors like Atom, Sublime Text (with legal license), Vim or even Notepad++ because it is the sum of all their virtues and none of their defects. It's fast, it has all the tools and plugins I need to work, and it's pretty and very good optimized. It has what I need to work and nothing more. And the main plugins works like a charm. Developing for React or Flutter is amazing. Even the TypeScript plugin works great. I like how IntelliSense works, and all the extra tools to code remotely using #ssh, access #RESTfulAPI or event manage projects or collaborating remotely. Thanks #Microsoft for Visual Studio Code.

    See more