#Frontend Development#Productivity#Web

Development

What are the best JavaScript IDEs?

Close
Slant is a new Q&A site that makes it easy to choose what to use.
Get recommendations
Ask a Question and our community will recommend the best Options that meet your actual needs.
Choose the best
Slant crowdsources research to save hours of work. All the information you need to choose is now in one place.
Join the Community
Slant works like a wiki anyone can edit. Help people find the right Option for them by sharing your knowledge.

 

 

openWhy do you recommend WebStorm?

openWhy don't you recommend WebStorm?

Intelligent code completion

   
Webstorm will auto complete JS variables, keywords, methods, functions and parameters. Webstorm can also offer completion from methods and functions

Code refactoring support

   
To make sure your code can be easily maintained, you must first be sure to make it is clean and tidy. This is the part where WebStorm really helps yo...

Not free for commercial use

   
A paid license is required to use WebStorm for commercial use. The license terms have changed (Nov 2015) and now require a subscription (per year: $...

 

 2

openWhy do you recommend Sublime Text?

openWhy don't you recommend Sublime Text?

Multi-line select and editing

   
Multiple cursors & column selection allow versatile ways of editing.ctrl + d will select the current word and each time the command is repeated a...

IDE features without the cruft

   
Sublime Text, while being lighter-weight than an IDE, still supports many IDE features. Text from the current file is used to provide autocomple...

No debugger

   
Sublime is a text editor with syntax highlight, but not a full IDE as it doesn't have a debugger. However, there are plugins available to add the...

 

 1

openWhy do you recommend Atom?

openWhy don't you recommend Atom?

Embedded Git control 

   
Will highlight folders, files and lines that have any uncommitted edits made. It also integrates really well with GitHub.

Built in package management 

   
Atom was built from the ground up with the community in mind, and package management is a first class feature.

Slow 

  5 
Atom is not a native application. As such performance is subpar and the lag is especially noticeable on larger projects. It also opens a surprising a...

 

 

openWhy do you recommend Vim?

openWhy don't you recommend Vim?

With the appropriate plugins, the venerable editor can be made into a full-blown IDE

Powerful capabilities

   
If you ever wonder what vim is capable of, the question is not "Can vim do this?" The question is "How can I configure vim to do this?...

Free

   
Vim is completely free to use.

Difficult for beginners

   
Vim is so weird to use that is has become the butt of numerous jokes: "I've been using vi for two years now, ... mostly because I can...

 

 1

openWhy do you recommend Visual Studio Code?

openWhy don't you recommend Visual Studio Code?

Code focused development. Redefined. Build and debug modern web and cloud applications. Code is free and available on your favorite platform - Linux,...

JavaScript IntelliSense

   
Javascript intellisense allows Visual Studio Code to provide you with useful hints and auto-completion features while you code.

Cross-platform 

   
Windows, Linux and OS X.

Slow loading time  

   
Since it's built on top of Atom's open source core, same as Atom it's pretty slow when first loading, especially compared to text editors...

 

 

openWhy do you recommend Brackets?

openWhy don't you recommend Brackets?

Brackets is an open source code editor for web designers and front-end developers.

Free, open source and cross-platform 

   
Brackets is entirely free and open source.

Can be hacked by any front-end developer

   
The editor is built using HTML, CSS and JavaScript making it extendable by any front-end developer.

One folder open at a time

  2 
Brackets only allows you to have one folder/project open at a time. Opening another folder will close the previous one. However you can open another...

 

 

openWhy do you recommend Codenvy?

openWhy don't you recommend Codenvy?

Developer workspaces to modify, run and debug code in the cloud or on-premises.

Easy setup

   
Once an account is set up and the user has logged in, all that's needed to start is to pick a language, a framework and a PaaS. Codenvy also allo...

Can provide a custom runtime environment

   
Codenvy can provide a runtime environment to test and debug code. This can also be used to share work progress with a client.Codenvy uses Docker as t...

Lacks Mercurial support 

   
Currently the Codenvy supports Git and SVN Version Control Systems. There are no plans announced for Mercurial.

 

 

openWhy do you recommend Microsoft's Visual Studio?

openWhy don't you recommend Microsoft's Visual Studio?

Javascript Intellisense

   
Javascript intellisense allows Visual Studio to provide you with useful hints and auto-completion features while you code.

Clean UI

   
Visual Studios has a clean, intuitive user interface.

Windows Only

   
Visual Studio is only available on Windows, though there is now a cross-platform derivation of Visual Studio named Visual Studio Code. It is has less...

 

 

openWhy do you recommend Light Table?

openWhy don't you recommend Light Table?

Inline evaluation

   
With LT's inline valuation you don't have to re-compile your whole source file, each time you want to see an output, all you have to do is ho...

Watches

   
According to its authors LightTable allows you to "watch your values flow through your code". Which essentially means you could see your co...

Supports limited programming languages for debugging purposes

   
Currently LT only supports Clojure/Js/Python for testing/debugging (namely the Watches feature).

 

 

openWhy do you recommend IntelliJ IDEA?

openWhy don't you recommend IntelliJ IDEA?

JS code context-awareness

   
Warns you when you forgot to declare "var", duplicate declarations, variable name refactors occure within the function scope, warns you wh...

Smart refactoring

   
IDEA places an emphasis in safe refactoring, offering a variety of features to make this possible for a variety of languages. These features include...

Requires license to use

   
Commercial-use license is hefty price of $500 USD, personal-use is $150 USD.However, there is a 30-day free trial period.

 

 

openWhy do you recommend Cloud9?

openWhy don't you recommend Cloud9?

Full terminal access

   
Cloud9 gives full terminal access to home directory. In their hosted Linux Ubuntu environment it has sudo powers. No UNIX commands have been blocked...

Enables real-time online collaboration

   
An important feature of Cloud9 is the real-time collaboration ability. It allows pairing programs or perform code reviews really easily as well as si...

Web based

   

 

 

openWhy do you recommend NetBeans?

openWhy don't you recommend NetBeans?

Autocompletes your code

   
Code auto-completion is of great help in agile development environments, where you're pumping out a new version as soon as possible. In such envi...

Powerful debugging and performance optimization

   
Netbeans not only debugs your code, and points out errors but also gives you hints on which sections of your code could be further optimized.

A little slow to load

   
The Netbeans IDE is known to take a large memory as compared to other lighter IDE's available in the market. Slowdown can decrease productivity a...

 

 

openWhy do you recommend Komodo IDE?

openWhy don't you recommend Komodo IDE?

Cross Platform

   
The KomodoIDE works on multiple platforms (Linux, Mac OS and Windows).

Built in Version Control

   
Since Version Control features are very frequently used these days, having them built right into your IDE seems quite the right thing to do. With Kom...

Not free

   
Komodo IDE costs you $89 for a personal license. Even though they have a Free basic version (that's also opensource), but this lacks most of the...

 

 

openWhy do you recommend Emacs?

openWhy don't you recommend Emacs?

Keyboard-focused, mouse-free editing

   
Emacs can be controlled entirely with the keyboard.

Self documenting

   
Emacs has extensive help support built-in as well as a tutorial accessed with C-h t.

Learning curve is steep

   
While it's better than it used to be, with most functions being possible through the menu, Emacs is still quite a bit different from your standa...

 

 

openWhy do you recommend Coda 2?

openWhy don't you recommend Coda 2?

Real IDE

   
What you would expect from an IDE. Supports multiple languages including all the standards, autocomplete of project names as well as language functio...

Mac Only & Commercial Only

   
Only on the Mac, although that does make it a native app, so fast. $99 after 30 day free trial.

 

 

openWhy do you recommend TextMate?

openWhy don't you recommend TextMate?

Lightweight footprint

   
It's lightweight footprint makes it extremely fast to load and use.

Open source

   
Textmate is open source and hosted on GitHub

Not free

   
TextMate is not free. There are different payment plans but the basic, single user license costs $59 USD.

 

 

openWhy do you recommend CodeLite IDE?

openWhy don't you recommend CodeLite IDE?

Modest memory footprint

   
CodeLite takes up about 50MB when loaded into memory with a workspace opened.

Open source and free

   
CodeLite is licensed under GPL with source code available on GitHub.

Bland UI

   
The UI is fairly boring and has limited customization options. There is a dark theme available, however it only applies to the editor. The surroundi...

 

 2

openWhy do you recommend Barebones BBEdit?

openWhy don't you recommend Barebones BBEdit?

Find and Replace in one panel with Grep, multi-file, selection-only...

   
Keyboard control of search and replace data allow keyboard only operation. Surpasses every other find-replace function in every other editor in speed...

Highly customizable key bindings, external utilities, scripting

   
Apply Nodejs text filters. Substitution tags in clippings. Flexible beyond conception.

No real project-wide autocomplete support

   
Supports cTags but that's not really useful

 

 1

openWhy do you recommend Aptana Studio?

openWhy don't you recommend Aptana Studio?

Git integration

   
Aptana provides integrated support for Git to make collaboration and version control easier.

Support for web projects

   
Aptana was specifically created for web application development. It supports a variety of languages such as HTML, CSS, JavaScript, PHP, and Ruby.

Many dependencies

   
Aptana has a couple of dependencies to keep in mind. It is built with Java and and has some requirements for the JDK version. Aptana requires Git, a...

 

 

openWhy do you recommend slap?

openWhy don't you recommend slap?

Sublime-like terminal-based text editor

First-class mouse support 

   
Supports mouse key bindings even though it works inside the terminal and also through SSH.

Uses desktop-like keybindings 

   
Features configurable keybindings (Ctrl+S, Ctrl+Z etc...)

Requires node.js  

   
Slap is written in JavaScript and it requires something to interpret it in a local machine. That something is node.js, but for people who don't n...

 

 

openWhy do you recommend Eclipse with JSDT?

openWhy don't you recommend Eclipse with JSDT?

Smart Code completion

   
Just like all other IDEs Eclipse also offers you inline code completion (even with any external JS libraries added to the project).

Quick Fixes

   
Eclipse with JSDT provides you with quick fixes every time a warning or error is raised by the IDE. This feature is particularly helpful at places in...

Plugins can be unstable 

   
Though there are plenty of plugins to choose from, they aren't always reliable. Some aren't maintained, bug fixes can be slow, and you may ne...

 

 

openWhy do you recommend Zed?

openWhy don't you recommend Zed?

Customizable themes

   
Zed provides you with both light and dark themes out of the box, or you can develop your own with CSS.

No auto complete

   
There is no auto-complete support built in for JavaScript.

 

 

openWhy do you recommend XCode?

openWhy don't you recommend XCode?

Great for Apple Development

   
Built-in Amulators

Mac Only

   

 

 

openWhy do you recommend Kakoune?

openWhy don't you recommend Kakoune?

Text selection mechanism

   
Kakoune works on selections, which are oriented, inclusive range of characters, selections have an anchor and a cursor character. Most commands move...

Lack of options/ability to customize

   
The ability to customize Kakoune are currently quite limited. Everything is hard coded, and there is a lack of options to choose from.

 

 3

openWhy do you recommend Espresso?

openWhy don't you recommend Espresso?

No pros added yet

No cons added yet