Tabby
A terminal emulator with built-in SSH, Telnet and serial clients for Windows, macOS and Linux.
- Stars
- 75.3k
- Forks
- 4.3k
- Licence
- MIT
- Language
- TypeScript
- Last update
- 4 days ago
- Type
- App
What it is
Tabby is a terminal app you open to run commands on your computer or on remote machines. It combines a terminal emulator with an SSH and Telnet connection manager, a serial terminal for hardware, and a split-pane, tabbed interface. People use it as an alternative to the default Windows terminal, PuTTY, or macOS Terminal.app.
- Save SSH connection profiles and reconnect to servers from a connection manager
- Split one tab into several panes to watch logs and run commands side by side
- Connect to a serial device, optionally view output as hexdump, and reconnect automatically
- Transfer files to and from an SSH session using Zmodem
Great for
- Developers who keep many SSH sessions open and want them saved and organized
- People who connect to serial devices such as embedded boards and need a built-in serial terminal
- Windows users who want PowerShell, WSL, Git-Bash or CMD in one tabbed window
- Users who want to transfer files over SSH sessions via Zmodem
Not ideal for
- People who need a very low memory footprint, since the README says Tabby is not lightweight and points to Alacritty or ConEmu for that
- Users who want a new shell or a replacement for MinGW or Cygwin, which the README says Tabby is not
- People who need a terminal that runs only in a browser, although a separate web app exists
How to get it
- 1
Download the app
Download the latest release from the releases page
git clone https://github.com/Eugeny/tabby - 2
Run it
- Download the installer for your system from the latest release page
- Install and open Tabby
- Create an SSH or serial connection from the connection manager
- Open the connection to start a session
- 3
Get the most out of it
- Install themes and plugins directly from the Settings view inside Tabby
- Use the Zmodem support to move files directly over SSH sessions
- Use the portable mode on Windows by creating a data folder beside Tabby.exe
- Pair with the self-hosted Tabby web app if you want SSH access from a browser
Downloads
Strengths
- Combines SSH, Telnet and serial clients in one app
- Highly configurable themes, colors and multi-chord shortcuts
- Supports many shells on Windows, including PowerShell, WSL, Git-Bash and CMD
Trade-offs
- The README states it is not lightweight in RAM usage
- Some features, such as tab completion on Windows, depend on an extra tool (Clink)
- Extra functions come from third-party plugins of varying maintenance status
How it compares
| Project | Stars | Type | Level | Updated | Best for |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| tabby (this) | 75.3k | App | beginner | 4 days ago | Developers who keep many SSH sessions open and want them saved and organized |
| hyper | 44.8k | App | beginner | 3 months ago | Developers who want a terminal they can customize with extensions or themes |
| upterm | 19k | App | intermediate | 7.5 years ago | Developers who want to try an Electron-based terminal with autocompletion |
| ttyd | 12.6k | Dev tool | intermediate | 3 months ago | Developers who want to open a shell on a home server or device from a browser |
| chalk | 23.3k | Library | beginner | 14 days ago | Node.js developers building command-line tools that print colored output |
| xterm.js | 21.3k | Library | intermediate | 7 days ago | Developers building a browser-based IDE or cloud workspace that needs an integrated terminal |
Stats synced from GitHub. The assessment above was drafted with AI from the project's README on 2026-10-29 and may miss recent changes — check the README before relying on a command. MIT licence: free to use, modify and distribute, including commercially, as long as you keep the copyright notice.