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Nano-emacs Alternatives
Similar projects and alternatives to nano-emacs
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Kargo
Stop Scripting Promotions. Start Shipping with Kargo. Kargo automates promotion across dev, staging, and prod with approval gates and verification. Open source, built by the team behind Argo CD. Download now.
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doom-emacs
Discontinued An Emacs framework for the stubborn martian hacker [Moved to: https://github.com/doomemacs/doomemacs]
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spacemacs
A community-driven Emacs distribution - The best editor is neither Emacs nor Vim, it's Emacs *and* Vim!
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swiper
Ivy - a generic completion frontend for Emacs, Swiper - isearch with an overview, and more. Oh, man! (by abo-abo)
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AppSignal
AppSignal knows why the f*#k it crashed. Stop vibe-debugging. Every exception, every backtrace, grouped so you see patterns, not noise.
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prelude
Prelude is an enhanced Emacs 29.1+ distribution that should make your experience with Emacs both more pleasant and more powerful.
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emacs-doom-themes
Discontinued A megapack of themes for GNU Emacs. [Moved to: https://github.com/doomemacs/themes]
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SaaSHub
SaaSHub - Software Alternatives and Reviews. SaaSHub helps you find the best software and product alternatives
NOTE:
The number of mentions on this list indicates mentions on common posts plus user suggested alternatives.
Hence, a higher number means a better nano-emacs alternative or higher similarity.
nano-emacs discussion
nano-emacs reviews and mentions
Posts with mentions or reviews of nano-emacs.
We have used some of these posts to build our list of alternatives
and similar projects. The last one was on 2025-11-01.
- Ask HN: Where to Begin with "Modern" Emacs?
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:syntax off (2016)
Both points resonate with me, but I'd push back againt the idea that colored syntax highlighting is neccessary for either. I'm thinking of the Pygments 'bw' theme[1], which denotes strings in italics, and nano-emacs[2], which also manages to do.. a lot with a little (at least aesthetically, ie. idk about code volume or corner cases).
1: https://pygments.org/styles/
2: https://github.com/rougier/nano-emacs
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Effect of Perceptual Load on Performance Within IDE in People with ADHD Symptoms
It's not adhd specific but https://arxiv.org/abs/2008.06030
After reading this I implemented a code theme based primarily around typographic variation like weight rather than color. It uses only two colors (black and deep purple) in two weights and one italic each. I have pretty severe adhd and it's hard to judge but after using it for a few months I think this is better for me. Previously I had been using solarized light for nearly a decade for probably similar reasons.
Nano emacs was created by the author of that paper and its default themes are based on it, if you want to try it without committing to hand-rolling a theme. Personally I found that one too "light" (typographically, not color) but I also have relatively poor vision and like a large and heavy font.
https://github.com/rougier/nano-emacs
- Not trying to start a rumble, but why emacs
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What is your favorite color scheme?
I love the nano themes from N. Rougier, maybe not what you are looking for... (I am not a coder), works best with the whole nano layout
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How to apply set dark theme in nano emacs?
there is issue on github related to this: https://github.com/rougier/nano-emacs/issues/138
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Kawase Blur has been added to SwayFX!
Emacs with https://github.com/rougier/nano-emacs
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How to find where the value of a parameter is set (font size)
Hi fellow r/emacs ers, I am struggling to reduce the size of the fonts my configuration. I have based it on nano-emacs, I am using the variable nano-font-size but the font size does not change.
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A less verbose OR more organized modeline
I've been using Nano (and before that Elegant) which substitutes a headline for the modeline. Unless you're in the mood to try something radical, I'm not sure that I'd recommend it. That said, what I've learned from the experience is that you don't need much in the modeline for it to be useful. I've done some customizations on Nano and am satisfied with:
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What is wrong with this face definition??? (error "Invalid face" bookmark-menu-heading)
I get an error message that I do not understand, when trying to apply nano-emacs from u/Nicolas-Rougier in my vanilla emacs
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A note from our sponsor - AppSignal
www.appsignal.com | 13 Sep 2026
Stats
Basic nano-emacs repo stats
56
2,934
3.2
3 months ago
rougier/nano-emacs is an open source project licensed under GNU General Public License v3.0 only which is an OSI approved license.
The primary programming language of nano-emacs is Emacs Lisp.
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