r/linux4noobs • u/medrinnn • May 31 '26
programs and apps Visual Studio Alternative For Linux
please any good alternative for visual studio bc I hate bloated electron apps aka vsc and also wanna use Linux but visual studio is not supported on Linux nor I wanna use wine for it I want a native ide for Linux like visual studio
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u/joe_attaboy Old and in the way. May 31 '26
No one has mentioned it, so I will:
Kate
This is a KDE application, so installing it will bring in a lot of KDE libraries, but that's not a big deal. I don't know if one would call it a full IDE, but it's pretty close. With configuration and plugins, you could set up a complete environment for coding, using git and triggering builds, all from inside the application.
I don't do any C++ coding, but I'm often writing and testing various scripts, or even just some plain old text editing, and this handles everything. A very large range of features.
Take a look.
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u/Red1269_ May 31 '26
I'm not a developer or programmer or anything but I do have to write python for computer science assignments at school and kate runs very nicely even on poor hardware
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u/joe_attaboy Old and in the way. May 31 '26
Yes, it does. Kate also has some features I love, like block selection and the ability to pop open a regex-capable search and replace directly below the main screen. Just a great all-around tool.
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u/FrontierMedicineEnte Jun 01 '26
To be fair, there aren't a lot of KDE programs I don't recommend anyway.
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u/MrTeels May 31 '26
VS Codium ? Open Fork (or so) of VS Code
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u/Sheepherder-Optimal Jun 01 '26
Why not just VSCode? I am pretty sure it is fully compatible with linux.
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u/Bovinous May 31 '26
Zed
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u/mensink Jun 03 '26
Zed is my main editor nowadays.
For PlatformIO embedded development however, I just use VSCode, because Zed insists on using clang for C/C++ LSPs.
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u/razorree Kubuntu, Debian May 31 '26
what language? Eclipse IDE? Jetbrains IDEA ? (i'm talking about IDEs, not just editors)
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u/aeveris May 31 '26
If you consider using Zed but want a slop-free alternative, check out Gram: https://gram-editor.com/.
If you want a nice vim-like CLI editor take a look at helix: https://helix-editor.com/.
Technically neither is a full blown IDE though, so maybe CLion is an option as others already suggested.
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u/dme4bama May 31 '26
Vim lol
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u/medrinnn May 31 '26
How to learn vim and be fast ?
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u/Friendly-Inspector71 May 31 '26
Vimtutor as an easy starting point.
Then maybe a cheat sheet for the first couple of months
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u/truethug May 31 '26
Print out a cheat sheet
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u/FAMPpro May 31 '26
I dont like the idea of cheat sheets. Its way bloated with useless shortcuts which beginners don't need. a better way is to google it when you want to use shortcuts
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u/ratoyantra May 31 '26
I got motivated to use vim cuz of theprimeagen. Been two years and I'm loving it.
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u/GlassboundIllusion Nvidia Bazzite with KDE Plasma May 31 '26
Use the tutor command: :Tutor
I just discovered this myself after having slowly taught myself many of the commands over the years with a cheat sheet I printed out and pinned to my desk. It's a nice tutorial.
I've heard you can get it to autocomplete like Visual Studio does, but I don't know how configure those kinds of plugins. It's hard for me to imagine it fully replacing something like being able to class search in Eclipse, but if it can be configured to do that, I might see if I can switch even on my Windows laptop for work.
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u/_Ryner Jun 04 '26
If it's a word you've already typed, you can autocomplete it with CTRL + p
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u/GlassboundIllusion Nvidia Bazzite with KDE Plasma Jun 04 '26
Sorry, I meant syntax sensitive autocompleting. For instance, if you start typing "set" and get a suggestion for all the setter methods in a given class.
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u/studiocrash Jun 01 '26
Start with vimtutor. Itās built into vim and will get you familiar with the basics pretty quickly.
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u/CardiologistLeft4030 Jun 02 '26
Vim is so good once you start to understand the motions and reasoning behind why the keys do what they do. It takes some rewiring of your brain and will feel unnatural for a little while but once it clicks itās awesome.
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u/FAMPpro May 31 '26
I think you write programs then try do some simple add plus minus logic programs. You will find yourself wanting to use shortcuts and thats the way I learned. And google shortcuts when you need one :q to quit btw
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u/versus666 May 31 '26
:q! Will never fail, in case of emergency.
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u/thetwelvegates12 May 31 '26
Theres vim cheat sheet mousepads too
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u/gmes78 May 31 '26
The JetBrains IDEs are the correct answer.
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u/nullrevolt Jun 03 '26
The ONE gripe I have with them is they are RAM intensive. I also had an issue where toolbox was generating a bunch of config files that were filling my drive for some weird reason.
Still my IDEs of choice, but they did take a step back in their latest releases.
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u/lmolter May 31 '26
Wait, I have Visual Studio Code (VSC) running happily on Fedora and MacOS. And it's free.
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u/Conscious-Secret-775 May 31 '26
Visual Studio Code is not Visual Studio. OP hates bloated electron apps and VSC is an electron app.
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u/lmolter May 31 '26
My bad. Sorry.
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u/Conscious-Secret-775 May 31 '26
It's really the fault of Microsoft's marketing dept. I am reminded of a quote from the Hitch hikers guide to the galaxy: 'The Hitchhikerās Guide to the Galaxy defines the marketing division of the Sirius Cybernetics Corporation as āa bunch of mindless jerks whoāll be the first against the wall when the revolution comes,ā'
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u/lmolter May 31 '26
It is really my bad because I didn't fully read the OP's post. They mentioned VSC as a non-contender. Missed that. For me? I don't really care. I use VSC with PlatformIO to compile C++ for IoT devices. I just don't have MS's stuff anywhere else.
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u/GarThor_TMK May 31 '26
Yep... I was about to also suggest vscode, or it's open source alternative vscodium, since that's what I use... (even though, I'm fully aware it doesn't even come close to the full power of the full visual studio suite out of the box).
Then I saw that OP doesn't want electron... so even though VSCode and derivatives are pretty light weight, and powerful w/ all the extensions you can get, that's clearly not what they're looking for.
I think in college we used Emacs & Eclipse, but that was like 20 years ago now, and there are probably better solutions... >_>
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u/mnemoflame May 31 '26
You could try WinBoat for running Visual Studio, but Neovim + LazyVim exists for this. Try Vim-Adventures for learning it.
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u/tanksc May 31 '26
Learn neovim! On distros with more recent versions, there is less dependency on plugins
The idea is that once you build the muscle memory, you can write and edit at the speed of thought
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u/pstanton310 May 31 '26
The answer is Jetbrains rider. Itās free for personal use and I like it even more than visual studio. Pretty much all the same features youād need for .NET development
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u/WorkingMansGarbage May 31 '26
CLion is what I've used. There's also KDevelop, Qt Creator, GNOME Builder and some others.
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u/vladjjj May 31 '26
Not sure I understand how VSC is more bloated than Visual Studio. But as others have said, if you want a fast version of VSC, Zed is the way to go. If you need a full blown IDE, the go with JetBrains.
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u/silenceimpaired May 31 '26
Look up Zedā¦ designed for coding with AI (including local) but built off Rust ā¦ by Atom, the people that Visual Studio Code ripped off
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u/Familiar-Newspaper23 May 31 '26
Not sure if itās fit your application but you can self host vscodium on a server locally as a docker container so that you could connect to it from whatever device youāve got just from the browser. I dont do programming so I dunno if thatād be what youād be looking for but thought Iād throw it out there.
Edit: you said you donāt want electron and I think that might underpin this but as itās running on a separate device Iām still wondering if it might work for you. Anyway like i mentioned I donāt really write code so maybe Iām off base here.
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u/stroke_999 May 31 '26
I don't know, why you need visual studio? There is visual studio code or vscodium, why not them?
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u/Straight_Mistake_364 May 31 '26
For those who want a very simple setup, there is "gedit" and "geany" that have plugins that enable to work as an IDE.
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u/doctornoodlearms May 31 '26
Theres also sublime
Ialsi started using helix which is similar to vim but feels less intimidating to me (also doesnt really have plugins)
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u/muffinstatewide32 May 31 '26
Native ide for linux apps? I dont think we have one. Builder might come close.
If you want visual studio? Jetbtains rider or a vm are your choices.
If you are looking for a text editor i recommend zed
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u/OrganicPause6530 Jun 01 '26
For Java: Jetbrains products are really good.
For the rest, personally i use Zed.
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u/ConsciousBath5203 Jun 01 '26
CLion is decent. But if you hate bloated apps, then why are you trying to get Visual Studio? Shit is more bloated than VSC.
Vim & GCC if you don't want bloat
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u/No-Display4786 Jun 02 '26
Jetbrains ides are pretty good if you don't mind high ram usage, qt creator is also very good for c++ development.
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u/Lotte_V Garuda Mokka š¦ | Mint Cinnamon šæ Jun 02 '26 edited Jun 02 '26
I can recommend JetBrains IDE's. They're not built with Electron, but Java and Kotlin. They're also cross-platform. I don't miss Visual Studio at all after I started using them.
Also, I don't know why so many others are recommending VScode. It's written in Electron and OP doesn't want that.Ā
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u/mbonanomi92 Jun 04 '26 edited Jun 04 '26
VSCodium is just the open source version of VSCode without Microsoft telemetry, officially supported for Linux.
NeoVIM with LazyVim is another opposite option, have a look at some screenshots on Google. It's a CLI with a modern look, yet very light and minimal.
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u/Prodiynx Jun 23 '26
- KDevelop (Qt) - Full IDE based on the Qt framework.
- Qt Creator (Qt) - Id say its similar to KDevelop but its designed for making Qt apps.
- Kate (Qt) - Lightweight editor, similar to VSCode (ish).
- Jetbrains IDEs (Intellij) - Heavy IDEs made for specific languages, basically all-in-one.
- Zed Editor (GPUI) - Relatively similar to VSCode but written in rust and less extension-focused.
My explanations arent the best but you get the idea (I hope)
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u/g1rlchild May 31 '26
Obligatory Emacs recommendation. The ability to change core IDE features simply because you want them to work a different way is crazy powerful in an incredibly liberating way.
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u/Dani_E2e May 31 '26
Welche Programmiersprache?
Java? >> eclipse
Geany << fĆ¼r kleine C Sachen
Gibt natĆ¼rlich noch viel mehr.
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u/F_DOG_93 May 31 '26
Visual studio is not supported on Linux? Just install VS Codium. It's Vs code, but without the bloatware and the spyware. It's very easy to install. Just go to the website, and it's basically just adding a gpg key and package respitory.
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u/EchoFieldHorizon May 31 '26
Punctuation would really help you make yourself better understood when others read your words. I had to reread your post several times.
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u/AiwendilH May 31 '26
You can have a look at these:
Edit: Added on which frameworks each is based.