--- title: GNU Emacs Reviews meta\_title: 'GNU Emacs Reviews 2026: Details, Pricing, & Features | G2' meta\_description: Filter 84 reviews by the users' company size, role or industry to find out how GNU Emacs works for a business like yours. aggregate\_rating: rating\_value: 4.5 review\_count: 84 scale: '5' date\_modified: '2026-08-09' parent\_category: name: Editor url: https://www.g2.com/categories/editor --- ### GNU Emacs Pros and Cons: Top Advantages and Disadvantages #### Quick AI Summary Based on G2 Reviews Generated from real user reviews Users love the **extensive customizability** of GNU Emacs, allowing for a tailored and flexible user experience. [(1 mentions)](https://www.g2.com/products/gnu-emacs/reviews?filters%5Bsentiment_snippet%5D=2485648&qs=pros-and-cons#reviews) Users love the **customization** options in GNU Emacs, enabling tailored experiences and extensible functionality. [(1 mentions)](https://www.g2.com/products/gnu-emacs/reviews?filters%5Bsentiment_snippet%5D=2485706&qs=pros-and-cons#reviews) Users experience a **steep learning curve** with GNU Emacs, requiring significant time to understand its complexities. [(1 mentions)](https://www.g2.com/products/gnu-emacs/reviews?filters%5Bsentiment_snippet%5D=2485655&qs=pros-and-cons#reviews) Users find a **steep learning curve** for GNU Emacs, often taking considerable time to understand its functionalities. [(1 mentions)](https://www.g2.com/products/gnu-emacs/reviews?filters%5Bsentiment_snippet%5D=2485668&qs=pros-and-cons#reviews) ### Top Pros or Advantages of GNU Emacs ##### 1. Customizability Users love the **extensive customizability** of GNU Emacs, allowing for a tailored and flexible user experience. [ See 1 mentions ](https://www.g2.com/products/gnu-emacs/reviews?filters%5Bsentiment_snippet%5D=2485648&qs=pros-and-cons#reviews) See Related User Reviews ![Ganesh G.](/assets/transparent-ad5be28fbcd25b7b08d2cebe1d957125437fb5407d75ee717965ad22c8808791.gif "Ganesh G.") GG Ganesh G. Small-Business (50 or fewer emp.) 5.0/5 "Highly Configurable and Extensible Platform" What do you like about GNU Emacs? Everything is configurable and extensible ##### 2. Customization Users love the **customization** options in GNU Emacs, enabling tailored experiences and extensible functionality. [ See 1 mentions ](https://www.g2.com/products/gnu-emacs/reviews?filters%5Bsentiment_snippet%5D=2485706&qs=pros-and-cons#reviews) See Related User Reviews ![Ganesh G.](/assets/transparent-ad5be28fbcd25b7b08d2cebe1d957125437fb5407d75ee717965ad22c8808791.gif "Ganesh G.") GG Ganesh G. Small-Business (50 or fewer emp.) 5.0/5 "Highly Configurable and Extensible Platform" What do you like about GNU Emacs? Everything is configurable and extensible ### Top Cons or Disadvantages of GNU Emacs ##### 1. Complexity Users experience a **steep learning curve** with GNU Emacs, requiring significant time to understand its complexities. [ See 1 mentions ](https://www.g2.com/products/gnu-emacs/reviews?filters%5Bsentiment_snippet%5D=2485655&qs=pros-and-cons#reviews) See Related User Reviews ![Ganesh G.](/assets/transparent-ad5be28fbcd25b7b08d2cebe1d957125437fb5407d75ee717965ad22c8808791.gif "Ganesh G.") GG Ganesh G. Small-Business (50 or fewer emp.) 5.0/5 "Highly Configurable and Extensible Platform" What do you dislike about GNU Emacs? Learning curve is very low and its take lot of time to figure out things. ##### 2. Learning Difficulty Users find a **steep learning curve** for GNU Emacs, often taking considerable time to understand its functionalities. [ See 1 mentions ](https://www.g2.com/products/gnu-emacs/reviews?filters%5Bsentiment_snippet%5D=2485668&qs=pros-and-cons#reviews) See Related User Reviews ![Ganesh G.](/assets/transparent-ad5be28fbcd25b7b08d2cebe1d957125437fb5407d75ee717965ad22c8808791.gif "Ganesh G.") GG Ganesh G. Small-Business (50 or fewer emp.) 5.0/5 "Highly Configurable and Extensible Platform" What do you dislike about GNU Emacs? Learning curve is very low and its take lot of time to figure out things. ## Top-Rated Alternatives [ ![Visual Studio Code](https://images.g2crowd.com/uploads/product/image/large_detail/large_detail_13aba37ae908d9cf29a2452925257ccc/visual-studio-code.jpeg "Visual Studio Code") Visual Studio Code 4.7/5(2,732) ](https://www.g2.com/products/visual-studio-code/reviews) [ ![Notepad++](https://images.g2crowd.com/uploads/product/hd_favicon/1487566090/notepad.png "Notepad++") Notepad++ 4.6/5(2,475) ](https://www.g2.com/products/notepad/reviews) [ ![Sublime Text](https://images.g2crowd.com/uploads/product/hd_favicon/1487566128/sublime-text.png "Sublime Text") Sublime Text 4.5/5(1,783) ](https://www.g2.com/products/sublime-text/reviews) [ View All Alternatives ](https://www.g2.com/products/gnu-emacs/competitors/alternatives) ![Alex K.](/assets/transparent-ad5be28fbcd25b7b08d2cebe1d957125437fb5407d75ee717965ad22c8808791.gif "Alex K.") AK Alex K. Director Computer Software Small-Business (50 or fewer emp.) 7/1/2016 "The last text editor / IDE you will ever need" 4.5/5 What do you like best about GNU Emacs? Completely customizable in every way. Very consistent user experience in either the terminal or as a GUI application. Switching between buffers (you'll learn about this quickly) and executing code right in Emacs is very easy. Working on a remote server, Emacs provides multiple windows (C-x 3) for sharing data between a command line and a text file that you might be editing--very cool! Emacs has been around since the late 1970's and is just as relevant to computing as it ever has been. Not many other software tools can claim this. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com. What do you dislike about GNU Emacs? Rather steep learning curve to get all the key chords down but they become second nature after a while. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com. Recommendations to others considering GNU Emacs: Don't expect to understand it right away but learning this program will help you understand computing much better. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com. What problems is GNU Emacs solving and how is that benefiting you? Python programming: great formatting help, text completion and text highlighting Org-mode: fantastic note taking tool. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com. Show More Current UserValidated ReviewerIncentivizedSource: G2 invite ![Verified User in Financial Services](/assets/icons/anonymous-avatar-purple-4ae1032bdb50ee5682003170c8184aee790d25958bd397abbd384ba52c596a7b.svg "Verified User in Financial Services") UF Verified User in Financial Services Enterprise (\> 1000 emp.) 2/17/2017 "The editor of god" 5/5 What do you like best about GNU Emacs? - You can use emacs do anything - Emacs totally configurable. - You feel better than vim user. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com. What do you dislike about GNU Emacs? Emacs starts slowly. You should wait more than 10 seconds sometimes. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com. Recommendations to others considering GNU Emacs: I recommend every vim user to use emacs. You will feel like as a god yourself. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com. What problems is GNU Emacs solving and how is that benefiting you? I use it to edit source code, view configuration file. I also use orgzly with emacs to schedule my calendar. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com. Show More Current UserValidated ReviewerIncentivizedSource: G2 invite ![Verified User in Computer Software](/assets/icons/anonymous-avatar-purple-4ae1032bdb50ee5682003170c8184aee790d25958bd397abbd384ba52c596a7b.svg "Verified User in Computer Software") GC Verified User in Computer Software Mid-Market (51-1000 emp.) 7/30/2016 "Much more than a text editor" 5/5 What do you like best about GNU Emacs? I love Emacs, it's my default text editor, terminal manager and sometimes mail client. It's infinitely extensible, and once you activate a few packages you'll see how powerful it can be. There is obviously something of a learning curve to Emacs, but at this point I can operate more effectively in an Emacs window than anywhere else on my machine. Furthermore, many of the Emacs keybindings are also the defaults in many other apps (Ctrl-A and Ctrl-E to get to the start and end of the line for example), and so having these stored in muscle memory makes your life better. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com. What do you dislike about GNU Emacs? Emacs comes with some dumb defaults (Having to type M-x goto-line to goto a given line number for example), the very first thing I do on a new Emacs install is to fix a whole bunch of these things, to the point that my .emacs.d directory contains hundreds of lines of Lisp. Protip: If you're just getting started, begin by installing something like Prelude, which is a set of Emacs configurations that fix a bunch of the insane defaults. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com. Recommendations to others considering GNU Emacs: If you're coming in fresh, consider whether you want to use Emacs or the more popular Vim, give both a whirl and see which makes most sense to you. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com. What problems is GNU Emacs solving and how is that benefiting you? I write code every day and Emacs is my IDE, text editor and shell. It allows me to be using the same environment on my laptop and the machines that I administer. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com. Show More Current UserValidated ReviewerIncentivizedSource: G2 invite ![chedi t.](/assets/transparent-ad5be28fbcd25b7b08d2cebe1d957125437fb5407d75ee717965ad22c8808791.gif "chedi t.") CT chedi t. Consultant Computer Software Small-Business (50 or fewer emp.) 4/22/2016 "Emacs review" 5/5 What do you like best about GNU Emacs? for me emacs is the best available editor on Linux, in addition to all the fantastic packages that you can install, you have a level of customization detail unprecedented. Other reasons are some iconic packages that I cannot live without anymore like maggit, org-mode and babel. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com. What do you dislike about GNU Emacs? It's sometime slow when executing heavy tasks and it for some action where io is needed the ui is blocked. The learning curve is quiet steep and no good default configuration is provided for new users (this is fixed by prelude or spacemac) Review collected by and hosted on G2.com. Recommendations to others considering GNU Emacs: If you are planning to start using emacs I would recommend that you start with the spacemac emacs distribution. It has many layer of functionnalities and a new users friendly interface and community. Also, keep in mind that emacs has a rich history and some of the decisions in the ui or execution is influenced by that heritage, but the good news is that almost everything can be customized to your specific needs. Knowing elisp is always a valuable plus but not really an obligation if you intend to use emacs solely as a text editor, but no one really does that. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com. What problems is GNU Emacs solving and how is that benefiting you? General programming tasks in python, js, haskell, c/c++ and lisp Data organization and task management with org-mode Literate programming with org-mode and babel Document authoring with Latex and org mode Code source management with maggit Review collected by and hosted on G2.com. Show More Current UserValidated ReviewerIncentivizedSource: G2 invite ![Rafik N.](/assets/transparent-ad5be28fbcd25b7b08d2cebe1d957125437fb5407d75ee717965ad22c8808791.gif "Rafik N.") RN Rafik N. Partner - 1st Guru Computer Software Small-Business (50 or fewer emp.) 10/18/2016 "The editor that came from heaven!" 5/5 What do you like best about GNU Emacs? The possibility to extend it with ease, Helps and its many packages, magit, orgmode, smartparens ... The buffers management, and the mighty tab indentation! Review collected by and hosted on G2.com. What do you dislike about GNU Emacs? The single -threading and locking... And poor support for some languages, which I honestly don't use! Review collected by and hosted on G2.com. Recommendations to others considering GNU Emacs: Spend time to learn it. Probability one of my most valuable IT assets. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com. What problems is GNU Emacs solving and how is that benefiting you? Productivity, self-confidence, and high geekiness levels! Review collected by and hosted on G2.com. Show More Current UserValidated ReviewerIncentivizedSource: G2 invite ![Miguel Angel A.](/assets/transparent-ad5be28fbcd25b7b08d2cebe1d957125437fb5407d75ee717965ad22c8808791.gif "Miguel Angel A.") MA Miguel Angel A. Instructor Professor Enterprise (\> 1000 emp.) 3/22/2016 "The best editor out there." 4/5 What do you like best about GNU Emacs? The best thing about emacs are how easy it is to extend it and how it has features for everything imaginable while still being a decently sized software package. It's also unobstrusive and is solid as a rock. Another good thing about Emacs is that it works exactly the same accross all it's supported platforms, down to the configuration files themselves. As a bonus, Emacs is also extensively documented and there are lots of useful information on the Web about it and it's configuration language Emacs Lisp. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com. What do you dislike about GNU Emacs? It's very steep learning curve. Though it's so well documented that's not really a problem. Enabling Cua-Mode (changes key bindings so that copy/paste/cut and the like use the traditional ctrl+c/v/x instead of Emacs quite unusual key binsings) is quite obscure. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com. Recommendations to others considering GNU Emacs: Emacs is probably the best text editor out there but it has a steep learining curve. My recommendation would be to take a couple of days to practice getting used to the key bindings and enabling Cua-mode. Another thing is that anyone using emacs should take the time to learn all abou org-mode. That's simply the best emacs feature in my opinion. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com. What problems is GNU Emacs solving and how is that benefiting you? I use emacs to write reports and white papers using the wonderfull and all encompasing Org-Mode. I also use it to write and debug python scripts, medium sized C/C++ programs and draw diagrams with Ditaa. Most of my academic and programming work is made with Emacs. The only thing I don't do with Emacs is Java programming, but that's mostly a problem with the language than the editor. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com. Show More 3/25/2016 Current UserValidated ReviewerIncentivizedSource: G2 invite ![Liam B.](/assets/transparent-ad5be28fbcd25b7b08d2cebe1d957125437fb5407d75ee717965ad22c8808791.gif "Liam B.") LB Liam B. Software Engineer Information Technology and Services Small-Business (50 or fewer emp.) 3/24/2016 "Emacs: a worthwhile investment in learning" 4.5/5 What do you like best about GNU Emacs? Emacs makes me more productive as a developer. org-mode (orgmode.org) has organized my entire life. It's practically its own operating system; there's very little that emacs can't do. Having used vim, Atom, Sublime Text, Notepad++ and a variety of other editors over the years, I always come back to emacs. The history of emacs is colorful and its cult-like following (see: Saint IGNUcious). One of the best features of emacs, often going unmentioned, is that it works just as well in a console as it does in a more modern graphical environment. So even in a PuTTY console on Windows (connected to, say, an EC2 instance) I can use emacs just like I would natively on OS X's desktop. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com. What do you dislike about GNU Emacs? Out of the box, it's pretty terrible. Try prelude for some better defaults: https://github.com/bbatsov/prelude The learning curve is step and seemingly almost infinite. In-depth configuration requires learning Emacs LISP. At first glance, it has an extremely unappealing color scheme and keys that will only familiar if you are using this keyboard: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space-cadet\_keyboard (what is a "Meta" key?!) and upon further inspection has some downright pathological behavior (leaving "emacs droppings", or files ending in "~" everywhere). Fortunately, these are easily resolved with one of the many "starter kits" including Prelude, mentioned above. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com. Recommendations to others considering GNU Emacs: Set aside a few weekends and go through tutorials, particularly the Emacs official guide. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com. What problems is GNU Emacs solving and how is that benefiting you? Emacs is a swiss-army chainsaw. Transforming large and numerous text files easily is a breeze, even if they reside on other machines. It's my daily-driver text editor and the first package I install on a new machine. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com. Show More Current UserValidated ReviewerIncentivizedSource: G2 invite ![Damon B.](/assets/transparent-ad5be28fbcd25b7b08d2cebe1d957125437fb5407d75ee717965ad22c8808791.gif "Damon B.") DB Damon B. Senior Forensic Analyst Computer Software Mid-Market (51-1000 emp.) 3/18/2016 "GNU Emacs, includes kitchen sink" 1.5/5 What do you like best about GNU Emacs? Emacs has been around forever, so has a large base of support and experience to go with it. The set of extensions is pretty extensive, though not always comprehensive. You can customize Emacs to do pretty much anything you like. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com. What do you dislike about GNU Emacs? It is overly complex, a bit on the large side, and one need to learn the LISP language to write extensions for Emacs. As a text editor, its keyboard shortcuts are fairly arcane. It uses a GUI only as an afterthought if at all, when available. It is not installed by default on many common systems (Mac OS, Linux) due to its large size and steep learning curve. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com. Recommendations to others considering GNU Emacs: Try Vim, SublimeText, Atom, and the other more modern editors out there too. If you'd still choose Emacs over them, it might be for you. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com. What problems is GNU Emacs solving and how is that benefiting you? I have used many text editing tools over the years, and looked for those that had at least basic understanding of different programming languages and the conventions that go along with them around tools, syntax, etc. A good text editor makes it easier to translate your thoughts into code and helps you find and organize your work. Emacs does an admirable job at these tasks, once you overcome the learning curve. However, it stands in isolation from other editing tools so if you are in an environment where you can't run Emacs, your skills don't translate well to other common editing tools. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com. Show More Current UserValidated ReviewerIncentivizedSource: G2 invite ![Verified User in Internet](/assets/icons/anonymous-avatar-purple-4ae1032bdb50ee5682003170c8184aee790d25958bd397abbd384ba52c596a7b.svg "Verified User in Internet") GI Verified User in Internet Mid-Market (51-1000 emp.) 7/13/2016 "Easy hot keys, customizable" 4/5 What do you like best about GNU Emacs? Nice hot key controls. Love the walkthrough tutorial that's always available, thorough enough without being overkill. Solid documentation. Great customization options. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com. What do you dislike about GNU Emacs? Took some time to get used to, but the tutorial is helpful and documentation is solid. Github defaulting to vim makes it frustrating for an emacs-dedicated user. If github defaulted to emacs, that would be awesome. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com. Recommendations to others considering GNU Emacs: Take the time to figure out what customizations you like, then go for it and recommend the best customizations to your team. Totally worth it. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com. What problems is GNU Emacs solving and how is that benefiting you? Nice text editor, use it all the time for quick notes in the terminal and have used it for fairly extensive programming projects. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com. Show More Current UserValidated ReviewerIncentivizedSource: G2 invite ![Clifton M.](/assets/transparent-ad5be28fbcd25b7b08d2cebe1d957125437fb5407d75ee717965ad22c8808791.gif "Clifton M.") CM Clifton M. Software Engineer Information Technology and Services Mid-Market (51-1000 emp.) 1/20/2016 "Emacs is a flexible, powerful editor for developers who take the time to learn it" 4.5/5 What do you like best about GNU Emacs? Emacs can be customized to fit specific needs. It provides the ability to use and assign keyboard shortcuts for many, many tasks. I like the ability to choose which plugins I use. I also like the ability to customize aesthetic aspects of my work environment, including the look and feel of Emacs. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com. What do you dislike about GNU Emacs? There is a steep learning curve. This must be overcome in order to be productive. It is not always as powerful as a full-fledged IDE like IntelliJ. Debugging a running program is not nearly as full-featured as debugging in a full-fledged IDE. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com. Recommendations to others considering GNU Emacs: Be prepared to spend a lot of time learning at the beginning, but, if you enjoy customizing your work environment and are willing to learn how to customize, Emacs can be an effective tool. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com. What problems is GNU Emacs solving and how is that benefiting you? I use Emacs for software development. It is my primary editor for working in Clojure. There are language-specific plugins that make it well-suited to development and help make me productive. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com. Show More Current UserValidated ReviewerSource: Organic ## Work at FreeCAD? Claim this profile to respond to reviews, update product info, and reach in-market buyers. 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