tabby

Tabby is a modern, highly customizable terminal emulator for Windows, macOS, and Linux. A terminal emulator is a program that provides a text-based interface where you type commands and see output, similar to the built-in Terminal app on macOS or Command Prompt on Windows, but with more features and flexibility. Tabby replaces or improves on tools like PuTTY, Windows Terminal, macOS Terminal.app, and iTerm by combining local terminal functionality with integrated SSH and serial connection management in one application.

The application works as a desktop app built with web technologies (TypeScript, Electron), meaning it runs a browser engine under the hood to render the UI. Key features described in the README include an integrated SSH client with a visual connection manager, support for SSH tunneling and jump hosts, a serial terminal for connecting to hardware like microcontrollers and network equipment, split panes (multiple terminal panels side by side in one window), a global hotkey to summon a dropdown Quake-style console, full Unicode support, progress detection, and an encrypted vault for storing SSH credentials securely. The plugin system lets you add features like Docker container connections, config syncing, and AI assistant integration. Themes are also installable from within the settings panel.

You would use Tabby if you frequently SSH into remote servers, connect to serial devices for hardware work, or simply want a more customizable local terminal than the system default. It is particularly well suited for developers and system administrators who manage multiple remote connections and want them organized in a tabbed interface with persistent session state. The tech stack is TypeScript running on the Electron framework, with plugins distributed via npm.