Chicken Scheme
Hacker ApprovedThe most recommended of 5 scheme implementations
A Scheme implementation people recommend for its easy, productive C interop, its compilation to portable C, and its simple library system. Critics mention a maze of eggs and SRFIs.
A Scheme implementation people recommend for its easy, productive C interop, its compilation to portable C, and its simple library system. Critics mention a maze of eggs and SRFIs.
27 people gave an opinion
- recommend it
- 25
- criticize it
- 2
- approval share
- 93%
Recommended in 10 of 13 months
- November 2025: recommended
- December 2025: not recommended
- January 2026: recommended
- February 2026: recommended
- March 2026: recommended
- April 2026: recommended
- May 2026: recommended
- June 2026: not recommended
- July 2026: recommended
- August 2026: recommended
- September 2026: recommended
- October 2026: recommended
- November 2026: not recommended (month in progress)
Owned for 3 years
Median of the 3 owners who said how long they have had it.
Each square is one year.
Why it carries the badge
- 25 people recommend itNeeds 10 or more, met.
- 13 recommenders for every criticNeeds 2 to 1 or better, met.
- Recommended in 10 of 13 monthsNeeds 4 or more, met.
The same three rules apply to every product, and the badge can’t be bought. How the badge works
What people say about it
The reasons people give, with the number of comments that give each one. Open a reason to read what they said.
Why people recommend it
Each mark is one comment
Easy, productive C interop and FFI
“The nearest miss for me is probably Chicken, where you can seamlessly inline C code but (fatally) not C++ templates.”
Comment from 20 Feb 2026 in “Show HN: A physically-based GPU ray tracer written in Julia” “Chicken indeed interoperates with C quite easily and productively.”
Comment from 12 Jan 2026 in “Zen-C: Write like a high-level language, run like C” “Chicken's easy to use and sensible FFI is big part of the reason”
Comment from 5 Oct 2026 in “Interview with Chicken Scheme Maintainer Sjamaan/Peter Bex” - Comment from 12 Jan 2026 in “Zen-C: Write like a high-level language, run like C”
- Comment from 17 Jul 2026 in “A Road to Lisp: Which Lisp”
Compiles to portable C
“It helped immensely that both Gwydion Dylan and Chicken Scheme compile their respective niche languages to portable C code.”
Comment from 12 Aug 2026 in “Ask HN: Have you used LLMs to reinvigorate you niche programming community?” “The generated C is reasonably portable, so you can run Scheme programs on systems that “don’t run Scheme”.”
Comment from 11 Aug 2026 in “Chicken Scheme 6.0 Released” “it's a pretty convenient compilation target, you get to use all the compilers and tool chains out there”
Comment from 12 Jan 2026 in “Zen-C: Write like a high-level language, run like C” - Comment from 3 Nov 2025 in “Lisp: Notes on its Past and Future (1980)”
Full R7RS and UTF-8 strings
“Chicken Scheme for completeneless (R5RS/R7RS-small + modules)”
Comment from 29 Apr 2026 in “Why I Still Reach for Lisp (& Scheme) Instead of Haskell” “Native UTF-8 strings are the part I care about most here.”
Comment from 11 Aug 2026 in “Chicken Scheme 6.0 Released” “this is a massive update full R7Rs support UTF-8 strings”
Comment from 11 Aug 2026 in “Chicken Scheme 6.0 Released” - Comment from 11 Aug 2026 in “Chicken Scheme 6.0 Released”
Batteries-included eggs library system
“CHICKEN is such a good design that adding/rolling your own library for whatever you need is so simple”
Comment from 24 May 2026 in “I keep bouncing off the Scheme language” “chicken scheme could fit into the python niche, because the eggs feel very batteries included”
Comment from 11 Aug 2026 in “Chicken Scheme 6.0 Released”
Other scheme implementations people recommend
The four most recommended other scheme implementations, with the same counts for each, so you can compare like for like. The tick on each bar marks the 2 to 1 line the badge needs.
| Product | Recommend | Criticize | Approval | Months | Owned | Badge |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Chicken SchemeThis page | 25 | 2 | 93% | 10 | 3 yrs3 owners | Approved |
| GNU Guile | 24 | 20 | 55% | 10 | — | — |
| Chez Scheme | 23 | 5 | 82% | 7 | — | Approved |
| S7 Scheme | 7 | 0 | 100% | 4 | — | — |
| Gambit Scheme | 5 | 1 | 83% | 4 | — | — |
What people said
31 of the 36 comments that mention it, newest first. Each links to the original comment.
“the chicken guys are probably the nicest people online”
“Chicken's easy to use and sensible FFI is big part of the reason”
“OFC it's instant under Common Lisp (SBCL) and Scheme (both S9 and Chicken)”
“or with Chicken Scheme 5 once you run these commands in a terminal”
“on Chicken 5 with the SICP related SRFI's loaded and maybe scm-sicp you can hit an almost 100% compatibility”
“you can just use Chicken Scheme 5 for all of them”
“It helped immensely that both Gwydion Dylan and Chicken Scheme compile their respective niche languages to portable C code.”
“it seemed possible to embed, but too complicated for my purposes”
“Those were major bottlenecks for any FFI-heavy Chicken Scheme app”
“the combination of what is listed in”
“Native UTF-8 strings are the part I care about most here.”
“Moving to full R7RS and UTF-8 strings was long overdue.”
“chicken scheme could fit into the python niche, because the eggs feel very batteries included”
“With Scheme/Chicken you will get lost in a maze of eggs and SRFI's.”
“Self-contained, compact, compiled, fast, ready to use.”
“I always liked Chicken's docs. They seem to be written with care and often make things understandable.”
“this is a massive update full R7Rs support UTF-8 strings”
“Error messages are actually useful with a stacktrace. Can't overstate this.”
“The generated C is reasonably portable, so you can run Scheme programs on systems that “don’t run Scheme”.”
“Chicken Scheme is a little gem!”
“Its easy to use FFI adds to productivity.”
“CHICKEN is such a good design that adding/rolling your own library for whatever you need is so simple”
“Chicken Scheme for completeneless (R5RS/R7RS-small + modules)”
“for SICP you can install Emacs+Geiser+chicken Scheme”
“The nearest miss for me is probably Chicken, where you can seamlessly inline C code but (fatally) not C++ templates.”
“I did really like what I saw in Chicken though.”
“Chicken indeed interoperates with C quite easily and productively.”
“it's still a fantastic language to interop with C”
“it's a pretty convenient compilation target, you get to use all the compilers and tool chains out there”
“I started playing with CHICKEN to scratch the itch of building something in Scheme and I couldn't stop.”
“the fact that it compiles to C and can generate binaries is a great plus”
Counts come from 1,795,640 Hacker News comments, November 2025 to November 2026. How we count. Report a mistake.