# DrRacket 5 Hacker News commenters recommended DrRacket and 4 criticized it, November 2025 to November 2026. It was recommended in 4 of 13 months. **Verdict:** Free IDE for Racket with features people say other editors lack, and used for teaching programming. Critics find its interface clunky and unintuitive, and say it can slow programs down. ## Why people recommend it - Features other editors lack (1 comments): "DrRacket the IDE has some nice features that just don't exist in other editors." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46025915)) - Good for teaching programming (1 comments): "I had a lot of fun teaching adults to program using DrRacket" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49664394)) - Visual view of import placement (1 comments): "Dr Racket lets you see visually where import goes into code" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49325954)) ## What people warn about - Clunky, unintuitive, unpolished interface (2 comments): "always found the "IDE" to be really unintuitive, clunky and weird" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46025828)) "It feels unpolished and a bit janky." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49332203)) - Dislikes it as a whole environment (2 comments): "DrRacket is easily the worst programming environment I've ever used." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47155649)) "something about Dr. Racket annoyed me" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49326152)) ## Alternatives hackers recommend - [HyperCard](https://hackerapproved.com/p/hypercard.md): 62 recommend - [QBasic](https://hackerapproved.com/p/qbasic.md): 27 recommend - [QuickBASIC](https://hackerapproved.com/p/quickbasic.md): 8 recommend - [Folk Computer](https://hackerapproved.com/p/folk-computer.md): 6 recommend - [Glamorous Toolkit](https://hackerapproved.com/p/glamorous-toolkit.md): 6 recommend ## Cite as Hacker Approved, "DrRacket", https://hackerapproved.com/p/drracket/ (counts from 1,795,640 Hacker News comments, November 2025 to November 2026).