GNU Info
Ranked 3 of 3 documentation viewers by recommenders
People recommend it as a descriptive offline documentation viewer that beats web search and is often preferred over man pages. Critics find it needlessly complicated and frustrating.
People recommend it as a descriptive offline documentation viewer that beats web search and is often preferred over man pages. Critics find it needlessly complicated and frustrating.
13 people gave an opinion
- recommend it
- 7
- criticize it
- 6
- approval share
- 54%
Recommended in 4 of 13 months
- November 2025: not recommended
- December 2025: recommended
- January 2026: not recommended
- February 2026: recommended
- March 2026: not recommended
- April 2026: recommended
- May 2026: not recommended
- June 2026: recommended
- July 2026: not recommended
- August 2026: not recommended
- September 2026: not recommended
- October 2026: not recommended
- November 2026: not recommended (month in progress)
Why it doesn’t carry the badge
- 7 people recommend itNeeds 10 or more, not met.
- 1.1 recommenders for every criticNeeds 2 to 1 or better, not met.
- Recommended in 4 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
Preferred over other documentation viewers
“I use it all the time, preferring it to everything else”
Comment from 20 Feb 2026 in “Notes on Clarifying Man Pages” “info is the superior documentation viewer”
Comment from 25 Dec 2025 in “How GNU Guile is 10x better (2021)” Descriptive and beats web search
“it's enormously descriptive and very useful - it beats googling stuff up, because a) it works offline”
Comment from 18 Jun 2026 in “Emacs, how it all started (for me)” “i prefer info in there to any online docs”
Comment from 1 Dec 2025 in “Ask HN: Linux offline knowledge base app?”
What people warn about
Each mark is one comment
Confusing and needlessly complicated to use
“it makes something simple into something complicated”
Comment from 20 Feb 2026 in “Notes on Clarifying Man Pages” “I have no idea how it works”
Comment from 20 Feb 2026 in “Notes on Clarifying Man Pages” Frustrating and irritating interface
“GNU could have done that instead of their `info` nonsense.”
Comment from 15 Feb 2026 in “I love the work of the ArchWiki maintainers” “Ah that crap is/was so rage inducing!”
Comment from 6 Apr 2026 in “Number in man page titles e.g. sleep(3)” “making info somewhat less terrible”
Comment from 20 Feb 2026 in “Notes on Clarifying Man Pages”
Other documentation viewers people recommend
The two most recommended other documentation viewers, 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.
See all 3 documentation viewers, rankedWhat people said
All 14 comments that mention it, newest first. Each links to the original comment.
“internal links between different parts of a man page still don't exist (unless you use GNU Info”
“it's enormously descriptive and very useful - it beats googling stuff up, because a) it works offline”
“Ah that crap is/was so rage inducing!”
“Eventually I facepalmed when I realized an Info version was available and switched to that.”
“`info foo | less` is a better info reader than `info foo`”
“it has better expositions for parameter expansions”
“making info somewhat less terrible”
“I have no idea how it works”
“I use it all the time, preferring it to everything else”
“it makes something simple into something complicated”
“GNU could have done that instead of their `info` nonsense.”
“getting something complaining about how GNU info was where to go”
“info is the superior documentation viewer”
“i prefer info in there to any online docs”
Counts come from 1,795,640 Hacker News comments, November 2025 to November 2026. How we count. Report a mistake.