zmx
Hacker ApprovedRanked 5 of 8 terminal multiplexers by recommenders
People recommend zmx for simple session persistence that keeps terminal state and scrollback, with remote reattach and minimal features. Critics say it can be buggy with screen repainting.
18 people recommended zmx in Hacker News comments, 2 had mixed feelings and 1 criticized it, November 2025 to October 2026.
Summary written by Claude from 31 comments. It was written before the November 2026 recount, and 28 of those comments still count.
21 people gave an opinion
- recommend it
- 18
- mixed feelings
- 2
- warn against or regret it
- 1
The record
Recommended in 10 of 12 months
In 16 different threads.
- November 2025: not recommended
- December 2025: recommended
- January 2026: recommended
- February 2026: recommended
- March 2026: recommended
- April 2026: recommended
- May 2026: recommended
- June 2026: recommended
- July 2026: recommended
- August 2026: recommended
- September 2026: not recommended
- October 2026: recommended
Why it carries the badge
- 18 people recommend itNeeds 10 or more, met.
- 18 recommenders for every criticNeeds 2 to 1 or better, met.
- Recommended in 10 of 12 monthsNeeds 4 or more, met.
- Recommended in 16 threadsNeeds 5 or more, met.
- The biggest thread supplies 22% of its recommendersNeeds half or less, met.
The same rules apply to every product, and the badge can’t be bought. Mixed feelings count toward neither side. How the badge works
What people say about it
Reasons grouped from a sample of 26 of the 32 opinions about it, picked in proportion to how many people recommend it, have mixed feelings and criticize it. Each mark is one comment in the sample. Open a reason to read what they said.
Why people recommend it
Each mark is one comment
Simple, minimal session persistence
“I built zmx because I wanted a simpler session persistence model that also supported remotely running, tailing, and waiting for commands to finish.”
Comment from 19 Oct 2026 in “Tmux and Claude Code: Sessions, Send-Keys, and the Ceiling” “It sounds like you could get away with using a tool like https://zmx.sh which only handles session persistence”
Comment from 21 Mar 2026 in “Ghostling” “Session persistence can be solved by zmx”
Comment from 7 Aug 2026 in “Herdr is joining Y Combinator. The runtime stays open” - Comment from 12 Jun 2026 in “Show HN: Boo – screen-style terminal multiplexer built on libghostty”
- Comment from 7 Aug 2026 in “Herdr is joining Y Combinator. The runtime stays open”
Restores scrollback and terminal state
“zmx holds onto terminal state and history and sends a snapshot on re-attach.”
Comment from 4 Dec 2025 in “Zmx: Session Persistence for Terminal Processes” “It uses libghostty to restore scrollback history and terminal state.”
Comment from 14 Apr 2026 in “Make Tmux Pretty and Usable” “It uses libghostty for rehydrating session state and scrollback”
Comment from 1 Mar 2026 in “Ghostty – Terminal Emulator” Works well over SSH and remote sessions
“seems to work quite well switching between my laptop and phone”
Comment from 25 Feb 2026 in “Claude Code Remote Control” “Whenever I need a process I can reattach to I wrap it in zmx.”
Comment from 8 Jul 2026 in “Herdr: One terminal to rule them all” Replaces tmux for many users
“beautiful piece of minimal software that basically has gotten rid of my tmux and zellij use”
Comment from 7 Jul 2026 in “Herdr: One terminal to rule them all” “It's great because it allows me to replace tmux completely in all my ssh sessions”
Comment from 20 Feb 2026 in “Show HN: Ghostty-based terminal with vertical tabs and notifications”
What people warn about
Each mark is one comment
Screen repainting glitches
“It's still a bit buggy (screen repainting) but quite pleasant to use with ghostty.”
Comment from 13 Apr 2026 in “Make Tmux Pretty and Usable”
Other terminal multiplexers people recommend
The four most recommended other terminal multiplexers, 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 | Mixed | Criticize | Approval | Months | Had for | Badge |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| tmux | 325 | 56 | 97 | 77% | 12 | 10 yrs12 people | Approved |
| Herdr | 170 | 43 | 60 | 74% | 5 | 1 mo18 people | Approved |
| Zellij | 75 | 14 | 29 | 72% | 12 | — | Approved |
| GNU Screen | 29 | 3 | 8 | 78% | 12 | — | Approved |
| zmxThis page | 18 | 2 | 1 | 95% | 10 | — | Approved |
Also compared with Rex by Superlogical.
What people said
26 of the 32 opinions about it, picked in proportion to the three counts, newest first. Each links to the original comment.
“zmx has more features than some things of a similar nature”
“it’s a great piece of software”
“I built zmx because I wanted a simpler session persistence model that also supported remotely running, tailing, and waiting for commands to finish.”
“Session persistence can be solved by zmx”
“for a more minimalist tool”
“That's something I built into zmx in order to scratch that "debugging in a remote VM" itch.”
“Following the docs though, with bash or zsh, I run into an issue when doing the following.”
“Whenever I need a process I can reattach to I wrap it in zmx.”
“I’ve used it for an hour and it already feels like second nature”
“beautiful piece of minimal software that basically has gotten rid of my tmux and zellij use”
“love zmx and it's minimalism policy”
“Been using zmx for a few months and love it”
“zmx avoids the alternate screen (tmux uses it by default, which makes scrolling agent output awkward”
“It uses libghostty to restore scrollback history and terminal state.”
“has been working very well for me”
“It's still a bit buggy (screen repainting) but quite pleasant to use with ghostty.”
“It sounds like you could get away with using a tool like https://zmx.sh which only handles session persistence”
“It uses libghostty for rehydrating session state and scrollback”
“seems to work quite well switching between my laptop and phone”
“It's great because it allows me to replace tmux completely in all my ssh sessions”
“Zmx is basically a single file with 1500 LoC”
“zmx might implement just the right amount of features for this use case”
“Works pretty well if you don’t need a window manager in your terminal”
“zmx holds onto terminal state and history and sends a snapshot on re-attach.”
“I want this, but with the window switcher from tmux”
“This almost seems perfect, and autossh + the ssh 'aliases' (d.term) in the readme are new to me”
Counts come from 1,791,911 Hacker News comments labeled by Claude, November 2025 to October 2026, with data through October 31, 2026. Counts updated 2 Nov 2026. How we count. Report a mistake.