w64devkit
Shares rank 17 of 18 c compilers by recommenders
A portable, self-contained Windows toolkit with a recent gcc, letting developers build native C and C++ programs without a full Visual Studio install.
A portable, self-contained Windows toolkit with a recent gcc, letting developers build native C and C++ programs without a full Visual Studio install.
5 people gave an opinion
- recommend it
- 5
- criticize it
- 0
- approval share
- 100%
Recommended in 4 of 13 months
- November 2025: not recommended
- December 2025: not recommended
- January 2026: recommended
- February 2026: recommended
- March 2026: not recommended
- April 2026: recommended
- May 2026: not recommended
- June 2026: not recommended
- July 2026: not recommended
- August 2026: not recommended
- September 2026: recommended
- October 2026: not recommended
- November 2026: not recommended (month in progress)
Why it doesn’t carry the badge
- 5 people recommend itNeeds 10 or more, not met.
- Nobody criticizes itNeeds 2 to 1 or better, 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
Enjoyable to use
“w64devkit is an absolute joy to use, and I'm surprised that it's still not widely adopted by devs.”
Comment from 21 Sep 2026 in “What's been going on in w64devkit the past year” Recent gcc compiler included
“32 bit version of w64devkit[1] does target it and provides a recent gcc version.”
Comment from 15 Jan 2026 in “Go-legacy-winxp: Compile Golang 1.24 code for Windows XP” Neat, useful kit
“This is a really neat kit”
Comment from 20 Sep 2026 in “What's been going on in w64devkit the past year” Easy setup with SDL2
“it's fine too; with just a few PATH settings and SDL2 libraries I could even compile UXN”
Comment from 22 Apr 2026 in “Windows 9x Subsystem for Linux”
Other c compilers people recommend
The four most recommended other c compilers, 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.
| Product | Recommend | Criticize | Approval | Months | Owned | Badge |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Fil-C | 160 | 60 | 73% | 13 | — | Approved |
| Claude's C Compiler | 39 | 83 | 32% | 5 | — | — |
| Visual C++ | 29 | 17 | 63% | 12 | — | — |
| Tiny C Compiler (TCC) | 22 | 3 | 88% | 9 | — | Approved |
| w64devkitThis page | 5 | 0 | 100% | 4 | — | — |
What people said
4 of the 5 comments that mention it, newest first. Each links to the original comment.
“w64devkit is an absolute joy to use, and I'm surprised that it's still not widely adopted by devs.”
“This is a really neat kit”
“it's fine too; with just a few PATH settings and SDL2 libraries I could even compile UXN”
“32 bit version of w64devkit[1] does target it and provides a recent gcc version.”
Counts come from 1,795,640 Hacker News comments, November 2025 to November 2026. How we count. Report a mistake.