# TidalCycles 9 Hacker News commenters recommended TidalCycles and 6 criticized it, November 2025 to November 2026. It was recommended in 5 of 13 months. **Verdict:** Lets musicians compose and perform live by writing algorithmic patterns, with a strong community and Haskell-based power. Critics say installation is difficult and complex pieces can struggle. ## Why people recommend it - Suits pattern-based composition, easier fugues (2 comments): "the language lends itself particularly well to this kind of stuff as opposed to more traditional song/track structures" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46141099)) "composing a fugue in the style of bach is much easier in tidal than in a DAW" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46144571)) - Full Haskell power and tooling (2 comments): "TidalCycles has the full power of Haskell, longer history, and more advanced tooling" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46128701)) "TidalCycles is a good example of another DSL built in Haskell" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46526416)) - Active, welcoming community (2 comments): "Tidal Cycles is hardly languishing." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46128692)) "A strong inviting community" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46355603)) ## What people warn about - Difficult to install (2 comments): "It's a full-on recipe, or a docker container." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46125811)) "it was a massive pita to get installed" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49381280)) ## Alternatives hackers recommend - [Sonic Pi](https://hackerapproved.com/p/sonic-pi.md): 32 recommend - [Loopmaster](https://hackerapproved.com/p/loopmaster.md): 15 recommend - [Cagire](https://hackerapproved.com/p/cagire.md): 6 recommend - [Dogalog](https://hackerapproved.com/p/dogalog.md): 5 recommend ## Cite as Hacker Approved, "TidalCycles", https://hackerapproved.com/p/tidalcycles/ (counts from 1,795,640 Hacker News comments, November 2025 to November 2026).