ProseMirror
Hacker ApprovedThe most recommended of 4 rich text editors
Recommended as a well-designed rich text toolkit that gives many editing features for free. Common caveat: awkward to use directly in React.
Recommended as a well-designed rich text toolkit that gives many editing features for free. Common caveat: awkward to use directly in React.
22 people gave an opinion
- recommend it
- 16
- criticize it
- 6
- approval share
- 73%
Recommended in 6 of 13 months
- November 2025: not recommended
- December 2025: recommended
- January 2026: recommended
- February 2026: recommended
- March 2026: recommended
- April 2026: not recommended
- May 2026: recommended
- June 2026: not recommended
- July 2026: recommended
- August 2026: not recommended
- September 2026: not recommended
- October 2026: not recommended
- November 2026: not recommended (month in progress)
Why it carries the badge
- 16 people recommend itNeeds 10 or more, met.
- 2.7 recommenders for every criticNeeds 2 to 1 or better, met.
- Recommended in 6 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
Well designed and carefully built
“ProseMirror (especially ProseMirror, in our opinion!) are all excellent rich text libraries”
Comment from 18 Mar 2026 in “We're building a better rich text editing toolkit” “ProseMirror and seemingly WordGard have real thought and care put into them”
Comment from 3 Jul 2026 in “Wordgard: The new in-browser rich-text editor from the creator of ProseMirror” “ProseMirror (and presumably Wordgard) just gets so much right.”
Comment from 3 Jul 2026 in “Wordgard: The new in-browser rich-text editor from the creator of ProseMirror” - Comment from 3 Jul 2026 in “Wordgard: The new in-browser rich-text editor from the creator of ProseMirror”
Backbone of web editors
“Shout out to Yjs, ProseMirror and BlockNote on which we relied to build LaSuite Docs”
Comment from 7 Feb 2026 in “France's homegrown open source online office suite” “CodeMirror and ProseMirror are impressive works and my current go-to libraries”
Comment from 6 May 2026 in “Collaborative Editing in CodeMirror” “Prosemirror over the years has become the backbone of editors on the web.”
Comment from 3 Jul 2026 in “Wordgard: The new in-browser rich-text editor from the creator of ProseMirror” Editing niceties come for free
“get pretty much every text editing nicety for free”
Comment from 17 May 2026 in “Native all the way, until you need text” “Prosemirror does this for you, if you want it”
Comment from 16 Mar 2026 in “Lies I was told about collaborative editing, Part 2: Why we don't use Yjs” Good base for custom apps
“I've been building my own writing app for a different purpose over the last month and have been pretty happy with PM”
Comment from 14 Mar 2026 in “Show HN: Ichinichi – One note per day, E2E encrypted, local-first” “you have really cool tools you can use as a foundation for something like this”
Comment from 30 Jan 2026 in “Grid: Forever free, local-first, browser-based 3D printing/CNC/laser slicer”
What people warn about
Each mark is one comment
Messy, hard-to-simplify change model
“I've always wondered why prosemirror's transactions & steps couldn't be simplified further”
Comment from 3 Jul 2026 in “Wordgard: The new in-browser rich-text editor from the creator of ProseMirror” “I'll be the first to admit that ProseMirror's change representation is a bit messy”
Comment from 18 Mar 2026 in “Lies I was told about collaborative editing, Part 2: Why we don't use Yjs” Missing features out of the box
“had a very hard time researching and implementing an @-style remote resource completion”
Comment from 3 Jul 2026 in “Wordgard: The new in-browser rich-text editor from the creator of ProseMirror” “ProseMirror doesn't provide virtualization out of the box.”
Comment from 31 May 2026 in “Show HN: Atomic Editor – Obsidian-style live preview for CodeMirror 6” “Prosemirror doesn't really have any mechanism to do this”
Comment from 3 Jul 2026 in “Wordgard: The new in-browser rich-text editor from the creator of ProseMirror”
Other rich text editors people recommend
The three most recommended other rich text editors, 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 4 rich text editors, rankedWhat people said
28 of the 30 comments that mention it, newest first. Each links to the original comment.
“ProseMirror (and as the sibling comment mention, Lexical) should handle this fine”
“ProseMirror (and presumably Wordgard) just gets so much right.”
“I think ProseMirror is a brilliantly designed project”
“ProseMirror and seemingly WordGard have real thought and care put into them”
“Prosemirror doesn't really have any mechanism to do this”
“I've always wondered why prosemirror's transactions & steps couldn't be simplified further”
“I'd pick prosemirror any day over Lexical.”
“If you're happy with ProseMirror, continue to use ProseMirror.”
“Prosemirror over the years has become the backbone of editors on the web.”
“had a very hard time researching and implementing an @-style remote resource completion”
“The weird unexpected DOM redraws that are still a thing in ProseMirror should not occur.”
“it's always been a bit awkward using it directly in React”
“rich text editors usually use a lossy intermediary format (e.g. prosemirror)”
“ProseMirror doesn't provide virtualization out of the box.”
“get pretty much every text editing nicety for free”
“CodeMirror and ProseMirror are impressive works and my current go-to libraries”
“Dramatically higher quality, in a way that is directly noticeable to users.”
“ProseMirror (especially ProseMirror, in our opinion!) are all excellent rich text libraries”
“It's just really hard to map correctly to ProseMirror as the merge logic is complex and bound to a schema.”
“I'll be the first to admit that ProseMirror's change representation is a bit messy”
“that is IMHO easier when dealing more closely with ProseMirror steps and transactions”
“but it's not a silver bullet”
“we support `react-prosemirror` directly with monetary compensation”
“Prosemirror does this for you, if you want it”
“typing in both felt slower than a vanilla contenteditable”
“I've been building my own writing app for a different purpose over the last month and have been pretty happy with PM”
“Shout out to Yjs, ProseMirror and BlockNote on which we relied to build LaSuite Docs”
“you have really cool tools you can use as a foundation for something like this”
Counts come from 1,795,640 Hacker News comments, November 2025 to November 2026. How we count. Report a mistake.