head to head · open source
Alacritty vs tmux
Alacritty has 65,928 GitHub stars, 3,636 forks, 340 open issues and last shipped 7 days ago. tmux has 49,900 stars, 2,942 forks, 44 open issues and last shipped 2 days ago. Alacritty leads on adoption by 32% (65,928 vs 49,900 stars). Alacritty is written in Rust under Apache-2.0; tmux is written in C under ISC. Alacritty has attracted 6% as many forks as stars, tmux 6%. tmux was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee.
Two open source projects, one decision. Both are free and self-hostable — the differences are community size, license terms, language stack and release pace.
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Side by side
| Alacritty | tmux | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 66K | ★ 50K |
| License | Apache-2.0 | ISC |
| Written in | Rust | C |
| Last push | 2026-10-05 | 2026-10-10 |
| Forks | ⑂ 3.6K | ⑂ 2.9K |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick Alacritty if
- You weight community size — 66K stars and counting
- You want the Apache-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Rust
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick tmux if
- You want the tmux feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the ISC license terms
- Your stack matches C
- You evaluated both and tmux fits your workflow better
About Alacritty
Alacritty is a cross platform, GPU accelerated terminal emulator written in Rust and released under the Apache License 2.0, aimed at developers and system administrators on BSD, Linux, macOS, and Windows who want fast terminal rendering and are willing to let a window manager or terminal multiplexer handle tabs and splits.
read the full Alacritty overview →
About tmux
tmux is an open source terminal multiplexer for developers and system administrators who need to create, manage, and return to multiple terminal sessions from a single screen.
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Frequently asked questions
Is Alacritty or tmux more popular?
Alacritty has 65,928 GitHub stars and tmux has 49,900. Alacritty has the larger community by that measure.
Are Alacritty and tmux free?
Both are open source. Alacritty is licensed under Apache-2.0 and tmux under ISC. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between Alacritty and tmux?
Alacritty is written in Rust and tmux in C. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, Alacritty or tmux?
Choose Alacritty if you want the larger community (65,928 stars) or its Apache-2.0 licence terms. Choose tmux if its feature set, stack or ISC licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.