It's close: Ghostty edges it 9.1 to 9.0, so the right pick depends on what you need. Ghostty wins on 3 of the 5 scores, GitHub on 2.
Developers on Mac or Linux who live in the terminal
Developers and teams who want hosting, code review and CI in one place
Score by score
The details
| Feature | Ghostty | GitHub |
|---|---|---|
| Category | Developer Tools | Developer Tools |
| Category rank | #2 of 10 | #4 of 10 |
| Developer | Mitchell Hashimoto and contributors | GitHub (Microsoft) |
| Pricing | Free | Free + paid plans |
| Usable for free | Yes | Yes |
| iPhone & iPad | — | ✓ |
| Android | — | ✓ |
| Mac | ✓ | ✓ |
| Windows | — | ✓ |
| Linux | ✓ | — |
| Web | — | ✓ |
Common questions
Is Ghostty better than GitHub?
It's close: Ghostty edges it 9.1 to 9.0, so the right pick depends on what you need. Ghostty wins on 3 of the 5 scores, GitHub on 2.
Which is cheaper, Ghostty or GitHub?
Ghostty: Free and open source; optional donations go through the non-profit Hack Club. GitHub: Free plan with unlimited private repos; Team from $4/user/month. On value for money, Ghostty scores higher.
Do Ghostty and GitHub work on the same devices?
Only Ghostty runs on Linux. Only GitHub runs on iPhone & iPad, Android, Windows, Web.
Which is more private, Ghostty or GitHub?
Ghostty scores higher on privacy (9.8/10). No account needed. Crash reports are saved locally and never sent anywhere automatically; you can share them yourself if you choose.
Strengths and weaknesses
Ghostty
- Fast GPU rendering with a native look
- Free, open source and run as a non-profit
- Hundreds of themes that follow light and dark mode
- No Windows app planned
- SSH hosts may need its terminfo installed
- AppleScript support is still a preview
Ghostty is a terminal emulator that refuses to choose between speed and polish. It renders on the GPU, uses real native tabs and splits on Mac and Linux, ships hundreds of themes that follow light and dark mode, and supports the Kitty graphics protocol and ligatures. Version 1.3 added scrollback search. It's free, MIT-licensed and run as a non-profit project. There's no Windows version, and remote SSH hosts may need its terminfo installed.
Full Ghostty review
GitHub
- Industry-standard home for code and open source
- Actions automates builds, tests and deploys
- Generous free plan with unlimited private repos
- Feature sprawl makes settings hard to navigate
- Outages can stall your whole team's workflow
GitHub is the default home for open source and many company codebases, and its tools are hard to beat. Pull requests, code review, Issues and Projects cover the full workflow, Actions runs your builds, and stacked pull requests are now built in. On paid Copilot plans, AI reviews your code and a cloud agent opens pull requests for you. The catch is growing complexity, and an outage can stall your whole team.
Full GitHub review
