# Terminator terminal emulator

12 Hacker News commenters recommended Terminator terminal emulator and 1 criticized it, November 2025 to November 2026. It was recommended in 7 of 13 months. It meets the Hacker Approved badge rule.

**Verdict:** A tiling terminal emulator that people recommend for easy split-screen layouts and drag-and-drop panels. Critics say it is slow and sometimes crashes.

## Why people recommend it

- Easy split-screen tiling workflow (4 comments): "being able to drag and drop panels to create layouts is such a strong workflow" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47209743)) "tiling managers like Terminator are, to me, the most efficient" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47944971)) "splitting screens is much easier work flow" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47420048))

## What people warn about

- Slow performance (1 comments): "my main terminal emulator is the bog slow but reliable Terminator" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46145928))
- Crashes frequently (1 comments): "Terminator wouldn‘t crash every other week" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47422483))

## Alternatives hackers recommend

- [Ghostty](https://hackerapproved.com/p/ghostty.md): 401 recommend
- [Termux](https://hackerapproved.com/p/termux.md): 188 recommend
- [iTerm2](https://hackerapproved.com/p/iterm2.md): 95 recommend
- [Warp terminal](https://hackerapproved.com/p/warp-terminal.md): 84 recommend
- [Kitty terminal emulator](https://hackerapproved.com/p/kitty.md): 79 recommend

## Cite as

Hacker Approved, "Terminator terminal emulator", https://hackerapproved.com/p/terminator/ (counts from 1,795,640 Hacker News comments, November 2025 to November 2026).