9 FREE text editors tools for developers

October 19, 2010 by Catalin Rosu - 31 comments

Have you ever felt overwhelmed by the number of applications for web development you can find online and didn’t know what to choose?

I am sure you did, as I was there, too.

If you are in this situation or if you are looking for alternatives then read more, because in this article I will present you some free development applications you can use to edit your files.

Notepad ++

Windows

The Notepad++ application is a free source code editor that supports several languages (programming, markup or script) and comes as a replacement for Notepad. It runs in the Windows environment and its use is governed by the GPL License.

Komodo Edit

Windows, Mac, Linux

Komodo Edit is a free and open-source code editor and it has a big brother named Komodo IDE (which isn’t free as Komodo Edit).

Aptana Studio 2

Windows, Mac, Linux

Aptana Studio includes extensive capabilities to build web applications using HTML, CSS and JavaScript and much more.

Web Tide

Windows, Mac, Linux

WebTide HTML editor is a new free HTML editor and it is also a programmer text editor. It contains code completion for PHP, HTML, CSS, Javascript, XML.

gedit

Linux

Gedit is the official text editor of the GNOME desktop environment, a general purpose text editor.

TextWrangler

Mac

TextWrangler is a general purpose text editor for Mac users. It also includes features like spelling and grammar checkers, find, compare and merge files differences.

Bluefish

Windows, Mac, Linux

Bluefish is a editor targeted towards programmers and web designers, with many options to write websites, scripts and programming code.

jEdit

Windows, Mac, Linux

jEdit is a free text editor that is written in Java language so it has the ability of running in Mac OS X, OS/2, Unix, VMS and Windows.

SciTE

Windows, Linux

SciTE is a SCIntilla based Text Editor, it’s currently available for Intel Win32 and Linux compatible operating systems with GTK+.

What about you? What other FREE text editor tool do you use?

Perhaps you’re using other free text editors not mentioned in this article. Do you use just one application or more? Share them with us by posting a comment!

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31 thoughts on “9 FREE text editors tools for developers”

Hagbard on October 19, 2010 at 21:35 said:

I am on Windows and my 2 major editors are Notepad2 (free, quick and simple) and EditPad Pro (heavy duty).
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Maverick on October 20, 2010 at 02:46 said:

Been using Notepad++ for years and love its simplicity and speed. I’ve tried Netbeans, Komodo, Aptana, and others, but I always end up going back to NP++. No bloat, no auto-complete (available as a plugin)… just right.
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Red on October 20, 2010 at 04:35 said:

Indeed, Notepad ++ never lets you down.
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Rafael on October 21, 2010 at 07:05 said:

Dont ever forget to mention VIM incredibly fast and powerful!
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- Red on October 21, 2010 at 07:15 said:
  
  Thanks for your good addition Rafael, I like that it’s fast and that’s available for most platforms.
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Hugo on October 22, 2010 at 15:54 said:

Geany for Linux
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- Red on October 22, 2010 at 15:58 said:
  
  Looks very nice and promissing, I will give it a try! Thanks for your suggestion Hugo!
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IzC on October 28, 2010 at 20:23 said:

I use Notepad++ with Plugins….
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Red on October 29, 2010 at 17:11 said:

Notepad++ it’s very popular as I noticed…
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arsen on November 26, 2010 at 15:57 said:

n++ is awsome… many times i tried to change it to something modern, but still i am on n++.. it makes addiction :)
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vasiauvi on January 16, 2011 at 17:05 said:

I have Aptana, Bluefish, jEdit, gedit, nano,vi,geany installed on my Linux but what I need is the knowledge and practice in html/css and other web design languages :)
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Katharine J. Tobal on January 30, 2011 at 12:21 said:

N++ is my Num.1 .. it’s very powerful one .
I use Aptana, jEdit, nano sometimes too.
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B12GolD on May 4, 2011 at 17:09 said:

I’m using Netbeans …it makes my work very easy
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- Paul Mountney on January 7, 2013 at 04:50 said:
  
  I love using NetBeans. I think it’s the best one out there. I’ve tried others, not N++ yet, but NB is the one for me right now.
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Michael Pehl on September 1, 2011 at 13:22 said:

Notepad++ with Zen Coding plugin, there is no better alternative :-)
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Track on September 4, 2011 at 09:17 said:

Keep notepad + +, very intensively exploited.
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Minion on September 8, 2011 at 19:26 said:

Used Notepad++ for years on Windows with a dark colorscheme being the only addition. I used Coda/TextMate/TextWrangler on OS X, then I switched over to vim/gvim/wvim on all my machines and have never looked back. Well, ok, I look back occasionally to N++/TextMate/Coda when I need to copy/paste large blocks of code quickly/often in serverclient situations that vim admittedly has a hard time handling. Yes, vim was a PITA to learn at first, but I find my typing/coding efficiency goes up markedly in vim as opposed to other editors.
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Sam on November 24, 2011 at 20:37 said:

CodeLobster
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miff on December 3, 2011 at 10:38 said:

Geany, works fine both on Linux and Windows
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Red on December 3, 2011 at 11:07 said:

Thank you all for sharing your thoughts about the text editors you’re using. I really appreciate!
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Dwijayasblog on December 28, 2011 at 17:43 said:

I don’t know which is the best of those, but I using Notepad++ to edit xml template and it help me to do other things, too.
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Wallas on January 27, 2012 at 04:03 said:

Sublime Text 2 – Windows, Mac, Linux
http://www.sublimetext.com/2
Among those who have used it thought best.
“Sublime Text 2 may be downloaded and evaluated for free, however a license must be purchased for continued use. There is currently no enforced time limit for the evaluation.”
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- Red on February 2, 2012 at 11:23 said:
  
  I’m currently testing it. Love it!
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  - dohliz on October 23, 2012 at 14:48 said:
    
    I absolutely prefer sublime!
    Its a must for the coder who like to feel TEXT inputs in DARKNESS like mine. everyday I use this after 10PM when everyone dreams asleep and I pull my poems.
    because I know;
    THE CODE IS POETRY;
    and in darkness-
    rises its touchiness
    to be loved.
    anyway,
    nice list of TEXT editors.
    Reply ↓
Pete on January 30, 2012 at 07:04 said:

Out of everything I’ve tried, I think using Komodo Edit in conjunction with Firebug is an unbeatable combo for quick, everyday work. Recently, everything now goes into Espresso 2 before the final FTP, but that’s not a free editor (it’s incredible for CSS though – the best, hands down).
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Ravi Menon on February 17, 2012 at 03:28 said:

I am a die-hard emacs user. I love the automatic tabbing to catch mismatched tags, parentheses, etc. I use it for html, css, javascript & C.
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Nancy on June 14, 2012 at 11:23 said:

Like these tools , especially notepad++. Sometimes Editplus write pages,it’s light and convenience.
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Michael on June 19, 2012 at 11:15 said:

I use Coda for mac and notepad++ on the windows side. Code2 is the best out there by far.
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Peter on July 27, 2012 at 10:52 said:

RJ TextEd is free, very comfortable and have inside preview for IE, Firefox and Google Chrome. Can preview PHP files if you have installed a localhost server like Xampp, Wampp or one else of these and give the path to the root directory of your desktop server in the Environments settings.
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Rasheeda on December 26, 2012 at 15:17 said:

I love using Dreamweaver. I love how files are organized and when I am doing web design, i can easily attach css files and find all definitions i need in a hierarchy and can access the php manual of a function by simply hovering around it. I work faster when using dreamweaver. However I use Komodo edit as well. i love the auto complete too.
I use notepad++ when i need to quickly edit something. It’s loads very fast and I love that. I tried aptana studio too but it seemed heavier than Dreamweaver and I didn’t enjoy using it to code. gedit too is cool, very cool for linux though.
Thanks for sharing this article, will check out the rest.
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sinhae on February 24, 2013 at 00:04 said:

Since over a year I’m very happy with the free version of Tincta http://mr-fridge.de/software/tincta/index.php
It’s similar to Fraise, which I used before, but it is in active development. There is also a paid version with more features, but the free one is perfect for my html/css and php development.
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