9 ms·

Termux

360 points by tosh 9mo ago

OsamaJaber 9mo ago
Sooooo underrated Incredibly handy when you're away from your machine
tetris11 9mo ago
the only true way to experience Emacs on android
- Antibabelic 9mo ago
  Not really? The Android version of Emacs is perfectly fine.
- Tiberium 9mo ago
  Modern Emacs isn't really meant to be used in a TUI, it has a very capable GUI. And there's a fully native Android port of that GUI. https://sourceforge.net/projects/android-ports-for-gnu-emacs/ https://sourceforge.net/projects/android-ports-for-gnu-emacs... https://mstempl.netlify.app/post/emacs-on-android/ https://mstempl.netlify.app/post/emacs-on-android/ https://kristofferbalintona.me/posts/202505291438/ https://kristofferbalintona.me/posts/202505291438/
  - timonoko 9mo ago
    Try this: (menu-bar-mode -1) (setq inhibit-splash-screen t) (setq inhibit-startup-echo-area-message t) (global-set-key "å" 'hippie-expand) (global-set-key "∆" 'toggle-truncate-lines) (global-set-key (kbd "<f12>") 'toggle-truncate-lines) (xterm-mouse-mode 1) (global-set-key (kbd "<mouse-5>") 'scroll-up-command) (global-set-key (kbd "<mouse-4>") 'scroll-down-command) ; (global-set-key (kbd "<wheel-up>") 'scroll-up-command) (global-set-key (kbd "<wheel-down>") 'scroll-down-command) ; (setq case-fold-search t) (setq-default truncate-lines t) (setq sort-fold-case t) (autoload 'scad-mode "scad-mode" "A major mode for editing OpenSCAD code." t) (add-to-list 'auto-mode-alist '("\\.scad$" . scad-mode)) (require 'scad-preview) (global-set-key (kbd "Å") 'dabbrev-expand) (add-hook 'python-mode-hook 'whitespace-mode) (setq whitespace-line-column 128) (custom-set-faces '(default ((t (:background "#000000" :foreground "#ffffff")))) '(whitespace-space ((t (:background "black" :foreground "blue")))) '(whitespace-tab ((t (:background "black" :foreground "blue")))) '(whitespace-newline ((t (:background "black" :foreground "blue")))) '(whitespace-empty ((t (:background "black" :foreground "grey50")))))
dharmatech 9mo ago
An experiment of using Python Textual to implement a phone app intended to run in Termux: https://youtu.be/sTj1FalZMVw?si=oq7uXCofjTGZO1F4 https://youtu.be/sTj1FalZMVw?si=oq7uXCofjTGZO1F4
kjuulh 9mo ago
Use it all the time. I've got a wireguard setup from phone or tablet to my workstation. Using mosh with zellij and I can do all the development I want. Whether it is restarting a machine, or actually writing code, using claude code etc. It works really well
mg 9mo ago
Is Termux still needed, now that new Android phones have a full Linux available? I keep reading on https://www.reddit.com/r/androidterminal/ https://www.reddit.com/r/androidterminal/ about user experiences with it and it seems pretty great.
- mystifyingpoi 9mo ago
  As you say, it is still very useful for older phones. Only the newest top-of-the-line ones got the real thing.
- rini17 9mo ago
  Apparently the OEM must support it (the AVF virtualization).
  - chocochunks 9mo ago
    The phone's hardware must also support it. It needs non-protected VM support which is available in Exynos SoCs but not Qualcomm which is why some Samsung phones have it but other arguably better phones don't (e.g, S25 Ultra VS. Flip 7).
    - WinstonSmith84 9mo ago
      Right, I enabled it, and got that exact error when starting the Terminal app on my Xiaomi 15: "Non-protected VMs are not supported on this device."
    - JoshTriplett 9mo ago
      Anyone know if the Samsung Z Trifold has VM support that works for the Android Terminal?
      - chocochunks 9mo ago
        No not right now at least, because it uses Qualcomm.
haunter 9mo ago
One of my favorite piece of software was made by the guy with Termux on his phone [0], absolute insane https://github.com/9001/copyparty https://github.com/9001/copyparty 0, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=15_-hgsX2V0&t=885s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=15_-hgsX2V0&t=885s
- mitkebes 9mo ago
  That's pretty funny, I use Copyparty a couple places, and never new it's origin.
  - zahlman 9mo ago
    You might be interested in a previous HN submission about it: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45984864 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45984864 including the author's commentary: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46056869 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46056869
- bdcp 9mo ago
  [flagged]
- pks016 9mo ago
  Best thing I saw this morning! I will have to check it out once I get home
  - haunter 9mo ago
    It's incredibly good and runs on pretty much everything. There is a read only demo here https://a.ocv.me/pub/demo/ https://a.ocv.me/pub/demo/
- mikewarot 9mo ago
  This made me realize I could upgrade my phone to hold all of my photos, with room to spare, thanks to 1 TB microsd cards. We're in the future!
alejoar 9mo ago
Termux has saved me countless times over the years.. One of the most powerful apps on my phone, that's come through whether I needed a quick SSH session to put out a fire or to get some real work done on the go.
mystifyingpoi 9mo ago
Termux is also an excellent solution for downloading videos from YouTube and similar sites, due to the fact that yt-dlp works really well (and using mobile data makes it easier to avoid IP bans, most of the time anyway).
- ErenayDev 9mo ago
  You can use an easier way for yt-dlp: https://github.com/deniscerri/ytdlnis https://github.com/deniscerri/ytdlnis
  - cess11 9mo ago
    How do I share the files back to Termux from this 'app'?
  - nisiddharth 9mo ago
    Even simpler is https://github.com/JunkFood02/Seal https://github.com/JunkFood02/Seal
- MarsIronPI 9mo ago
  If you disable SELinux, I believe you can also set up the MPV app to use Termux's yt-dlp executable.
deleted 9mo ago
[deleted]
timonoko 9mo ago
I have webserver in Termux which is viewed in a watch. Kinda difficult to explain. But Copilot says: Provide a single-line weather summary (temperature, wind direction name + degrees, wind speed, symbol text) for use elsewhere (repo name suggests it’s for a clock/display). https://github.com/timonoko/Supersaa_kelloon https://github.com/timonoko/Supersaa_kelloon
Fluorescence 9mo ago
I love termux. I can run my normal terminal environment - tmux, fish, just, git, zoxide, yazi etc. and build rust apps. With decent auto-complete/fuzzy-search, it's very ergonomic for only needing a couple of key presses to get things done. I'm impressed that TUI apps like yazi/nnn respond to touch. It's a very viable app platform for those inclined. Out of curiosity, is there an equivalent on ios with that level of support?
- nasretdinov 9mo ago
  In iOS we can only use something like ish.app which emulates x86 and runs full Linux distro instead, with predictably much lower performance than Termux (due to JIT being banned in iOS apps), but without any restrictions Android has on the executables
  - DrNefario 9mo ago
    I don't have an iPhone, but wouldn't UTM be better for that use case?
    - nasretdinov 9mo ago
      UTM can't be installed from the App Store unfortunately, and without a developer license you are limited to 7 days for each successful on-device reinstall
      - dudewhocodes 9mo ago
        Apple somewhat lifted the emulator restrictions on the App Store which means you can install UTM from here: https://apps.apple.com/us/app/utm-se-retro-pc-emulator/id1564628856 https://apps.apple.com/us/app/utm-se-retro-pc-emulator/id156...
        nasretdinov 9mo ago
        Nice, I must've missed that. Downloading it right away :) Edit: well, it's also very slow unfortunately. I believe iPhone CPUs either don't support virtualisation or they don't expose it (edit #2: it's the latter). Either way, QEMU is struggling quite a bit, and due to it being a GUI it's even slower than what iSH could do
cfiggers 9mo ago
Termux is the first app I install on every Android device I get my hands on. It's astonishingly capable. I have a Bluetooth keyboard case for my Android tablet. All the time, I use Termux to ssh into my Linux machine over my home network and code on it in Neovim from my couch. I don't bother with the default notes app on my phone. Termux + Neovim running vimwiki and syncing to a private GitHub repo is way better. Most stuff you want at the CLI is in the Termux package repository. On the occasions when it isn't, you can install clang, make, cmake, ninja, whatever libraries you need, and build it from source. At that point most stuff just works. Termux is incredible and single-handedly keeps me running Android.
- firecall 9mo ago
  What keyboard case do you use? My android phone is a Pixel 8 and that sounds cool :-)
  - cfiggers 9mo ago
    I actually have like, four different ones... :^))) I'm a bit of a keyboard fiend. The main one I use with my Android tablet specifically is a no-name brand, knock-off "magic keyboard"-style folio case that I got on AliExpress for like, 45 USD. I ordered the English layout, I received the Spanish one (which is mostly the same but had additional legends for Spanish characters). Le sigh. It's AliExpress, I didn't bother contacting support. For my phone, I have a really old Zagg one that was originally for an iPad. The iPad has long since died but the keyboard lives on. Woo! The main keyboard I type on all day at my desk is a Logitech Pebble K380s. It can store three different connection profiles, which can be either Bluetooth or Logi unified receiver. So I have one of those profiles set to connect to my Pixel 8 via Bluetooth (typing from that now). Makes toggling back and forth between that and my desktop very smooth. On a "real keyboard" (like this K380s) there's a dedicated Esc key. Most tablet folio cases don't have Esc. I found an app called "External Keyboard Helper Pro" that lets me rebind Caps Lock to Esc. That makes Neovim much more pleasant.
    - firecall 9mo ago
      Thanks for the info!
GlenTheMachine 9mo ago
“Extendible” —> extensible, I believe
PlatoIsADisease 9mo ago
I forget about how many Android only Apps I've used through the years. Emulators, fdroid, pulse wave generator(not sure if iphone has it, but they don't have aux ports anymore), termux, probably more... I don't think about it. That all said, I've heard news about Android getting degraded by Google to be more like Apple. Hope its rumors, but at least I had a good decade+.
nickjj 9mo ago
I use Termux to run SSH on demand, it's quite nice for rsync'ing files between my phone and desktop. The on demand nature of it is a major selling point to me. When I open Termux and run SSH it's up, if I shut down Termux, SSH goes away with it. That and I can use rsync which is a tool I've been using for syncing files for a long time. There's no need to run always-on tools like LocalSend or SyncThing, at least not for my use case. I have a little "sync" shell script on my desktop I can run to easily sync files "desktop TO phone" or "phone TO desktop".
- sejje 9mo ago
  Fwiw I use syncthing, but I don't leave it always on.
- nisiddharth 9mo ago
  There's an app "Material Files", there you can add SSH servers as storage locations and then copy paste files as if the locations are mounted in your phone.
bluebarbet 9mo ago
Honest question, as a heavy desktop TUI user who has had Termux installed for years. A terminal (emulator) is a keyboard-based environment. How on earth are all you fans making it work with a tiny touchscreen?
- ezequiel-garzon 9mo ago
  Sessions tend to be way shorter for me, but it's great to have.
- poolnoodle 9mo ago
  Tiny fingers or bluetooth keyboards
- ifelsewhy 9mo ago
  This is why I'm looking forward to the new Android devices with keyboards. I can't do anything productive on a touchscreen.
  - deleted 9mo ago
    [deleted]
  - dotancohen 9mo ago
    You might want to look at the S-Pen. I can not stand the on-screen keyboards with my fingers, but they are not so bad with the S-Pen. That's the only reason I still buy Samsung devices.
- genezeta 9mo ago
  Portable Bluetooth keyboard.
- dotancohen 9mo ago
  I often use a Bluetooth keyboard with Termux. But as a mechanical keyboard affectionate with a veritable museum of ergonomic and mechanical keyboards, the Samsung S-Pen is good enough for terminal work. I use SSH, VIM, and lately Org mode in Termux. If I'm at a desk I still use a Bluetooth keyboard, but if I'm out then the S-Pen is a fine enough substitute. Right now I'm on an S24 Ultra, before that a Note 10 Lite, and before that another Note 10 Lite.
Ingon 9mo ago
Termux is great - one of the ways I use it is to install the golang toolchain and compile/run connet.
anasrin 9mo ago
Best terminal emulator on Android, my day to day basis is note-taking (fzf, Neovim, Git) and SSH (when I'm too lazy to open up computer). Also you can build some CLI or TUI using Go and compile using Android NDK and run it on Termux.
firecall 9mo ago
There’s an app called Termux in the iOS App Store, but I’m guessing it’s not the same thing?
- bryanrasmussen 9mo ago
  no, it's not, termux requires low level access to the OS that iOS protects against.
  - mrsssnake 9mo ago
    No, it does not have any more access than any other app, as it work on unrooted devices too. That said, it has to be compiled for older Android SDK level because newer levels prevent apps to run executables they downloaded on their own and not bundle with the APK, even isolated. Android may disable compatibility with the older SDK some day but for now it works.
    - bryanrasmussen 9mo ago
      sorry, it was my understanding that Android apps have lower level access to the Android OS than iOS apps allow, that essentially iOS apps are sandboxed? And that this was what was allowing Termux to do everything it did in Android.
- alamortsubite 9mo ago
  Termux is the best of Android and sadly there's nothing like it on iOS. I'd ditch my Pixel today for the iPhone that's sitting on my desk collecting dust if there were.
bear330 9mo ago
I also really like Termux. When I was developing https://github.com/nuwainfo/ffl https://github.com/nuwainfo/ffl (a tool similar to croc, but the receiver uses a browser and doesn't need to install anything), it was because I wanted an easy way to get things off my phone. I actually packaged ffl—which is pure Python—into an APE just to make it compatible with Termux. Although many people here use ssh, rsync, or solutions like copyparty, I prefer my own minimalist solution: just one binary to transfer whatever I want. Anyway, Termux is cool.
- yjftsjthsd-h 9mo ago
  May I also recommend https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46855265 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46855265
alance 9mo ago
Fwiw termux + rsync for android phone backup (eg rsync /storage/emulated/0/) will grab most things.
r17n 9mo ago
Everyone posting seems to love this. Can folks provide some of their use-cases?
- pawelduda 9mo ago
  I use it all the time to SSH into my workstation and check on long-running tasks, code, etc. - Using vim/neovim is way better than I'd expect on a phone keyboard, because you can move around faster with less keypresses. - My terminal sessions are wrapped in tmux, so switching between devices is seamless (tmux panes resize without any problems to match your device dimensions/aspect ratio as soon as you interact with the terminal - nothing ever breaks). You can do the pinch gesture to change the text size, depending on what you need to see at the moment. - Both devices are using tailscale, so all I need is cellular data connection. For low quality network coverage I use mosh, which makes the session truly unkillable and makes sure it will recover when the connection comes back, albeit I ran into some annoying limitations with text scrollback. With the recent development of agents, it becomes even more effective, since I can just open up claude session, type the prompt and have the agent do the heavy-lifting (mostly writing large chunks of code). This greatly compresses the amount of text you'd have to type and makes phone-only coding more viable than ever.
- dhoe 9mo ago
  It's my primary environment for anything code related (I'm not a developer by profession). Cheap tablet in vertical model, cheap keyboard, termux, tmux, Claude Code with instructions to offload anything more resource intensive to a 5$ VPS. I'll not claim it's perfect - occasionally Claude does try to run something that crashes termux, and the keyboard mappings are not ideal - but it's good enough that I haven't needed a laptop in over a year.
  - bluebarbet 9mo ago
    >it's good enough that I haven't needed a laptop in over a year Not to single you out but I worry about this trend. As things stand, free (FLOSS) privacy-respecting computing remains all but impossible on the mobile platform. If now Termux is encouraging even geeks to abandon the desktop, that seems like a net negative.
Rygian 9mo ago
My usecase for Termux: most pictures get backed up properly into the home NAS, but the sync process sometimes skips a few [1] (which is exasperating, but here we are still not migrated to Immich). So I have a python script in the NAS that calculates the MD5 checksum of every photo and video, and generates a shell script that, when executed on the phone, will calculate the MD5 on the local device, and delete if it is equal to the NAS. The generated shell script gets sent to the phone, then I execute it from within a Termux window, pointing at the DCIM folder. I can free up tens of GB of memories with reliability in the face of a misbehaving sync algorithm. [1] https://help.nextcloud.com/t/auto-upload-is-skipping-random-pics/222184 https://help.nextcloud.com/t/auto-upload-is-skipping-random-...
- thekoma 9mo ago
  How come you don’t just send the md5s to delete rather than the shell script?
  - vasco 9mo ago
    I guess it's a more flexible design that allows to change the criteria for deletions in the future. You still need to calculate md5s on the phone either way.
  - Rygian 9mo ago
    That would definitely work too. What I like about my process is that there is only one source script (the python one) to keep around.
- dizhn 9mo ago
  That nextcloud issue is quite weird and people seem to have had better luck with the sync app downloaded from places other than the Play store. I personally would lose any confidence in the app and use a completely separate thing to do the syncing if that happened to me. I actually did use the nextcloud client on pc a while ago and it was kind of fickle in other ways too anyway so I stopped using it.
  - 9mo ago
kqr 9mo ago
I have been using Termux to SSH to other machines for quite some time, but only relatively recently did I have a flash of insight: I can use Termux to write applications for my phone in Perl (!). A year ago I used it to solve Advent of Code problems on my phone during my work commute. It was lovely. I have also used it to get access to a resampling calculator and a mental logarithm trainer on my phone.
ce4 9mo ago
I use it for lots of stuff, remote scanning from an old Canon flatbed scanner attached to my NAS (powered by a really ugly phone-local bash script, nothing else), rsync, renames (or the like using one liners), ssh tunnels to different destinations (to circumvent IP blockages) and of course YT downloads (using the source git folder and running it using "python -m yt_dlp $OPTIONS $URL" - when it breaks, a git pull is all it needs most of the time, I also have local patches that are not upstreamed)
mimasama 9mo ago
I use Termux for my OTP implemented in a bash script, I trust oathtool more than an app.
- bluebarbet 9mo ago
  So do I and this is a legitimately great idea for Termux.
boneitis 9mo ago
Another nifty utility to use in tandem is scrcpy[0]. Inside or outside of Termux, it allows you to interact with your android device in general from the comfort of your main computer/laptop over ADB. It becomes a super multiplier for Termux when I don't want to deal with the hassle of connecting a separate keyboard to my android phone/tablet. (A heads up, I have to use the `--render-driver=software` switch in order for scrcpy to work at all on my laptop.) [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scrcpy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scrcpy
- dizhn 9mo ago
  You need developer mode enabled for this right? Do you use any banking apps? The one I want to use for NFC payments doesn't work when developer mode is enabled. I am wondering if this is a global thing.
  - boneitis 9mo ago
    Ah yes, I'm pretty sure developer mode is required. My banking app works for logging in to check account balances, even despite having a rooted device. Though, I have not set up any kind of payment methods, Android Pay, etc.
- qiine 9mo ago
  > `--render-driver=software` Nvidia GPU? Have you tired `--render-driver=opengl`
  - boneitis 9mo ago
    Intel UHD. Unless they changed the default sometime in the past year or two, it seems opengl is already the default. Oddly enough, it is working for me right now on that setting. It was a painful troubleshooting process when I first installed it that took me a long while to stumble upon the software renderer option.
meatjuice 9mo ago
Being able to use openclaw or github copilot remotely through ssh would be nice. I think there should be a dedicated interface though, typing into termux using on-screen keyboard is a real pain.
twism 9mo ago
I've tried Termux but use the old irssiconnectbot (https://github.com/irssiconnectbot/irssiconnectbot https://github.com/irssiconnectbot/irssiconnectbot) but with slight modifications over the years since its open source... along with an also modified hackerkeyboard (https://github.com/klausw/hackerskeyboard https://github.com/klausw/hackerskeyboard) to support my workflow which is heavy on emacs and GNU Screen. The colors/graphics seem to be better on irssi and can also handle all the emacs and gnu screen keyboard chords and escape sequences. I try every android terminal but nobody is really thinking about running more than simple commands.
_sinelaw_ 9mo ago
It even runs Fresh so you can have a mini VSCode-like experience on your phone (pkg update && pkg install fresh-editor)
ramblin_ray 9mo ago
What's the difference between this and Termius, especially for those who are just ssh'ing into their home machines?
- smetannik 9mo ago
  Termius is SSH client. Termux is basically a terminal emulator + package manager. You can run Node, Rust, Claude Code locally on your phone. As an example - I used it to do Rustlings every day I commute on a subway. NYC subways don't have mobile network coverage, so I can't just SSH there into a remote machine.
leephillips 9mo ago
I use it to run Julia on my phone: https://lee-phillips.org/juliaOnPhone.jpg https://lee-phillips.org/juliaOnPhone.jpg
- eigenspace 9mo ago
  Do you have instructions somewhere for getting this to work? I've tried installing julia on termux a few times with no success.
  - leephillips 9mo ago
    I just downloaded the archive (from the usual Julia downloads page) for ARM on the phone and put a link to the binary in /usr/local/bin — same as on Linux desktop. But I did this in the proot Debian environment.
    - eigenspace 9mo ago
      Ah I see. Even after installing proot Debian I couldn't get juliaup to work, but I'll have to give it a shot manually installing the binary and linking to /usr/local/bin
1vuio0pswjnm7 9mo ago
Imagine Termux with a "VPN mode" so that privileged ports could be forwarded
ratrocket 9mo ago
Adding to the many other great uses of termux already here, the most useful lately for me is running Syncthing. After the "drama" with the Syncthing android client (my understanding: official development stopped due to onerous requirements from the Google, then the most popular fork was transferred to a new owner in a less-than-fully-trustworthy manner), being able to just run syncthing from the command line is a breath of fresh air. I highly recommend using Unexpected Keyboard along with termux (a recommendation I myself almost certainly got from HN).
- kid64 9mo ago
  I remember hearing something about the circumstances of that transfer, do you have a link/reference. Also, when you run Syncthing (the normal build I assume, without the Android wrapper), are you able to reliably prevent Android from killing it?
  - ratrocket 9mo ago
    Last things first: on my phone I only run syncthing "on demand", so I can't actually answer your question. Maybe someone else can chime in? From the little I've brushed up against the issue you're referring to, I think there's a way to have it not get killed, but it seems like it might be a little bit of a hassle. On the transfer, here is what I could dig up: The github issue about it was deleted, but archive.org has copies: https://web.archive.org/web/20251215062049/https://github.com/researchxxl/syncthing-android/issues/16 https://web.archive.org/web/20251215062049/https://github.co... HN discussion of same (with another link to the syncthing forum): https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46184730 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46184730 Lobsters discussion: https://lobste.rs/s/urbcpw/potential_security_breach_syncthing https://lobste.rs/s/urbcpw/potential_security_breach_syncthi... (and here is the announcement that the official android syncthing app was being discontinued: https://forum.syncthing.net/t/discontinuing-syncthing-android/23002 https://forum.syncthing.net/t/discontinuing-syncthing-androi...) No shortage of reading if you have the time! I'm quite happy to be running just the "standard" package (although, yeah, I should've pointed out that I don't run in continuously on my phone...)
deleted 9mo ago
[deleted]
bergheim 9mo ago
With how AI based dev is going, I'm guessing more and more people will discover and start using termux, tmux and the like. Typing on a phone sucks, but at least modal modes (vim) and unexpected keyboard[1] makes it somewhat tolerable. 1: https://github.com/Julow/Unexpected-Keyboard https://github.com/Julow/Unexpected-Keyboard
- jatora 9mo ago
  suffice it to say that you just changed my morning with this link lol. god i love this keyboard.
- zahlman 9mo ago
  I've been dreaming lately of a Switch 2-sized device with ergonomic handles on the sides, with buttons built into the handles that implement a chording keyboard (like how a braille writer works).
- zem 9mo ago
  wow, that does look like the perfect companion app to termux! thanks for the pointer.
pxc 9mo ago
Since no one makes Android devices with hardware keyboards anymore, I almost never use this kind of software anymore. After getting burned by a couple of Kickstarter phones hampered by half-baked software and total lack of updates, the only thing I could rationally conclude is that Android as a productivity platform is a lost cause. When Android was new, I very frequently used Termux and ConnectBot with my first few Motorola Droid phones. For a brief moment, I had a working phone with a great physical design only held back by an outdated chipset and being locked to Planet Computers' abandonware. I could touch-type at 80 WPM on an easily pocketable device! Termux shone there. So many things about Android were not just more exciting in terms of potential when it was new, but actively better: wider variety of hardware, widely unlocked bootloaders, no remote attestation, etc. Termux sadly feels like a painful reminder of that to me.
- crtasm 9mo ago
  There's two upcoming I look forward to seeing reviews of: https://www.androidauthority.com/unihertz-titan-2-elite-qwerty-android-phone-3634132/ https://www.androidauthority.com/unihertz-titan-2-elite-qwer... https://www.engadget.com/mobile/smartphones/clicks-is-bringing-its-first-smartphone-and-a-new-keyboard-to-ces-2026-182239003.html https://www.engadget.com/mobile/smartphones/clicks-is-bringi...
- angra_mainyu 9mo ago
  I have a tiny but very comfy bluetooth keyboard, though 90% of the time I use a keyboard with android I'm using my tablet (and it's easy to forget it's not a laptop).
kirito1337 9mo ago
the best thing ive ever downloaded on a phone
jFriedensreich 9mo ago
Important to note that termux, while it was always great and indispensable, is getting increasingly interesting now because android is getting full desktop mode at the same time as XR glasses (xreal, viture etc.) are becoming mainstream. You can have a linux desktop in your pocket everywhere without rooting, hacking or tinkering, just install termux and x11 server. While not all packages work, llms are increasingly powerful, just an example porting deskflow from a debian package to termux took about 4 hours max, something i would not even have had an idea how to start just 4 months ago.
- antirez 9mo ago
  I would bet the popularity is due to coding agents. For the first time you can continue the work without typing much but just inspecting the output and provading further guidance with relatively short messages.
  - jFriedensreich 9mo ago
    I bet thats true, but that use case will be much much better served by the native vm based linux terminal, not sure what sandboxing you can use in termux.
- fermuch 9mo ago
  I use my Meta Quest 3 with Termux & Termux X11 to run full desktop apps, and it works like a charm. No emulation, too! Native ARM64!
  - 1dom 9mo ago
    This is interesting! Do you have any more info? I just discovered sunshine/moonlight work surprisingly well on Quest 3 for remote desktop to linux, I'd not really considered Termux X11 natively though.
superjose 9mo ago
I discovered it 1 week ago. I don't know why I never tried this in the past! SSHing my machine and vice-versa! Just figured out that I could use my computer's terminal to send to my android's clipboard via SSH. Pair it with Tailscale and we have a beast!
goodburb 9mo ago
You can now run Docker images in Termux with Udocker/proot[0], the disk IO can be a bottleneck for large databases when using proot. Tailscale works with "--tun=userspace-networking" [1]. I had it running on an old phone as a Frigate server with a solar powerbank in remote area, using the 4G as a failover. The uptime is almost a week without solar. Attiny hooked to the power button and a photodiode on the phone flash [2] (blink per minute) used as a watchdog for shutdowns/hangs to hardware reset. The button cap is removed without disassembling the phone. Old phones are still more efficient than most off the shelf SBCs, especially under load. ~3W compared to 12W with a Pi5 in the same performance ballpark. [0]: https://github.com/George-Seven/Termux-Udocker https://github.com/George-Seven/Termux-Udocker https://github.com/indigo-dc/udocker https://github.com/indigo-dc/udocker [1]: https://tailscale.com/kb/1112/userspace-networking https://tailscale.com/kb/1112/userspace-networking [2]: https://wiki.termux.com/wiki/Termux-torch https://wiki.termux.com/wiki/Termux-torch
mikewarot 9mo ago
I use Termux to host my 11/780 VAX/VMS system on my cheap ass Motorola phone, thanks to SimH. Beware of one thing, though... if you upgrade Termux, or remove/reinstall, you lose everything inside that "linux" system. I lost my first VAX setup that way. 8(
devsda 9mo ago
I mainly use it as an ssh client and run network tools like ping etc. It is on the list of must haves I install on a new device. I just hope against hope that Google doesn't limit its functionality further and point us towards the new terminal app in the name of security.
maxamillion 9mo ago
Galaxy Tab S11, in DeX Mode, with the Book Cover Keyboard Slim, running Termux and Tailscale is a great companion device to ssh to any system on my tailnet so I can do real work on the road. So good. I donate monthly to Termux, you should too. :)
MarsIronPI 9mo ago
Does anyone know of an X server or Wayland compositor app for Android that gives each window its own Android window (or whatever they're called on Android)? IMO that'd mix perfectly with Termux for GUI apps. Yes, I know Termux-X11 exists but that app is a single Android window (again, I'm not sure if that's the right term) for all X windows. I'm wondering if there's an app that creates an Android window for each X window.
bitwize 9mo ago
Enjoy it while it lasts, folks. Android has since implemented restrictions on which binaries may be run from an installed app; any spawned processes must also come from binaries installed from Google Play. Termux is currently grandfathered in because it's still built against the last API version not to have these restrictions (28?). But it's only a matter of time before that version starts throwing "This app was built for an old version of Android and may not work properly on new devices" errors and then, stop working altogether...
- qiine 9mo ago
  I will not go into that good night gently.
RiceNBananas 9mo ago
[dead]
javier_e06 9mo ago
Termux and I have a love-hate relationship. Is my go-to app in my ARM based chromebook. Yet I am forced to upgrade the package manager to install git and other tools and once the package manager upgrades.. SSL library breaks. So you get ONE CHANCE to install your packages before SSL gets upgraded and bam! No more installations for you. I go to the usual places to look for fixes and it's like yeah yeah yeah. Try this.. tried? Still broken, beats me. That's what I get for sticking with 32 bit ARM chromebook. Lightning fast. Great battery. Old OS.
bhelkey 9mo ago
One downside of Termux is the package management as described here [1]. Some new phones have access to Android Linux Terminal [2]. It is similar to Windows Subsystem for Linux. Like WSL, Android Linux Terminal lets one use apt directly. [1] https://wiki.termux.com/wiki/Package_Management https://wiki.termux.com/wiki/Package_Management [2] https://deepakness.com/blog/android-linux-terminal/ https://deepakness.com/blog/android-linux-terminal/
spidermonkey23 9mo ago
I like to use with termux_xfce proot to use calibre on the go etc
chlorion 9mo ago
I have been able to do some light programming in elisp in termux in emacs on my moto g. My emacs config is now setup to detect termux and config itself accordingly which is neat. Also I have a wireguard vpn setup so that I can ssh between my phone and desktop computer via a VPS with a public ipv4 address. This allows me to just "ssh 10.0.0.4" to access the phones sshd, instead of having to deal with changing IP addresses and NAT traversal.

Termux

360 points by tosh 9mo ago

OsamaJaber 9mo ago

Sooooo underrated Incredibly handy when you're away from your machine

tetris11 9mo ago

the only true way to experience Emacs on android

Antibabelic 9mo ago
Not really? The Android version of Emacs is perfectly fine.
Tiberium 9mo ago
Modern Emacs isn't really meant to be used in a TUI, it has a very capable GUI. And there's a fully native Android port of that GUI. https://sourceforge.net/projects/android-ports-for-gnu-emacs/ https://sourceforge.net/projects/android-ports-for-gnu-emacs... https://mstempl.netlify.app/post/emacs-on-android/ https://mstempl.netlify.app/post/emacs-on-android/ https://kristofferbalintona.me/posts/202505291438/ https://kristofferbalintona.me/posts/202505291438/
- timonoko 9mo ago
  Try this: (menu-bar-mode -1) (setq inhibit-splash-screen t) (setq inhibit-startup-echo-area-message t) (global-set-key "å" 'hippie-expand) (global-set-key "∆" 'toggle-truncate-lines) (global-set-key (kbd "<f12>") 'toggle-truncate-lines) (xterm-mouse-mode 1) (global-set-key (kbd "<mouse-5>") 'scroll-up-command) (global-set-key (kbd "<mouse-4>") 'scroll-down-command) ; (global-set-key (kbd "<wheel-up>") 'scroll-up-command) (global-set-key (kbd "<wheel-down>") 'scroll-down-command) ; (setq case-fold-search t) (setq-default truncate-lines t) (setq sort-fold-case t) (autoload 'scad-mode "scad-mode" "A major mode for editing OpenSCAD code." t) (add-to-list 'auto-mode-alist '("\\.scad$" . scad-mode)) (require 'scad-preview) (global-set-key (kbd "Å") 'dabbrev-expand) (add-hook 'python-mode-hook 'whitespace-mode) (setq whitespace-line-column 128) (custom-set-faces '(default ((t (:background "#000000" :foreground "#ffffff")))) '(whitespace-space ((t (:background "black" :foreground "blue")))) '(whitespace-tab ((t (:background "black" :foreground "blue")))) '(whitespace-newline ((t (:background "black" :foreground "blue")))) '(whitespace-empty ((t (:background "black" :foreground "grey50")))))

dharmatech 9mo ago

An experiment of using Python Textual to implement a phone app intended to run in Termux: https://youtu.be/sTj1FalZMVw?si=oq7uXCofjTGZO1F4 https://youtu.be/sTj1FalZMVw?si=oq7uXCofjTGZO1F4

kjuulh 9mo ago

Use it all the time. I've got a wireguard setup from phone or tablet to my workstation. Using mosh with zellij and I can do all the development I want. Whether it is restarting a machine, or actually writing code, using claude code etc. It works really well

mg 9mo ago

Is Termux still needed, now that new Android phones have a full Linux available? I keep reading on https://www.reddit.com/r/androidterminal/ https://www.reddit.com/r/androidterminal/ about user experiences with it and it seems pretty great.

mystifyingpoi 9mo ago
As you say, it is still very useful for older phones. Only the newest top-of-the-line ones got the real thing.
rini17 9mo ago
Apparently the OEM must support it (the AVF virtualization).
- chocochunks 9mo ago
  The phone's hardware must also support it. It needs non-protected VM support which is available in Exynos SoCs but not Qualcomm which is why some Samsung phones have it but other arguably better phones don't (e.g, S25 Ultra VS. Flip 7).
  - WinstonSmith84 9mo ago
    Right, I enabled it, and got that exact error when starting the Terminal app on my Xiaomi 15: "Non-protected VMs are not supported on this device."
  - JoshTriplett 9mo ago
    Anyone know if the Samsung Z Trifold has VM support that works for the Android Terminal?
    - chocochunks 9mo ago
      No not right now at least, because it uses Qualcomm.

haunter 9mo ago

One of my favorite piece of software was made by the guy with Termux on his phone [0], absolute insane https://github.com/9001/copyparty https://github.com/9001/copyparty 0, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=15_-hgsX2V0&t=885s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=15_-hgsX2V0&t=885s

mitkebes 9mo ago
That's pretty funny, I use Copyparty a couple places, and never new it's origin.
- zahlman 9mo ago
  You might be interested in a previous HN submission about it: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45984864 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45984864 including the author's commentary: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46056869 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46056869
bdcp 9mo ago
[flagged]
pks016 9mo ago
Best thing I saw this morning! I will have to check it out once I get home
- haunter 9mo ago
  It's incredibly good and runs on pretty much everything. There is a read only demo here https://a.ocv.me/pub/demo/ https://a.ocv.me/pub/demo/
mikewarot 9mo ago
This made me realize I could upgrade my phone to hold all of my photos, with room to spare, thanks to 1 TB microsd cards. We're in the future!

alejoar 9mo ago

Termux has saved me countless times over the years.. One of the most powerful apps on my phone, that's come through whether I needed a quick SSH session to put out a fire or to get some real work done on the go.

mystifyingpoi 9mo ago

Termux is also an excellent solution for downloading videos from YouTube and similar sites, due to the fact that yt-dlp works really well (and using mobile data makes it easier to avoid IP bans, most of the time anyway).

ErenayDev 9mo ago
You can use an easier way for yt-dlp: https://github.com/deniscerri/ytdlnis https://github.com/deniscerri/ytdlnis
- cess11 9mo ago
  How do I share the files back to Termux from this 'app'?
- nisiddharth 9mo ago
  Even simpler is https://github.com/JunkFood02/Seal https://github.com/JunkFood02/Seal
MarsIronPI 9mo ago
If you disable SELinux, I believe you can also set up the MPV app to use Termux's yt-dlp executable.

deleted 9mo ago

[deleted]

timonoko 9mo ago

I have webserver in Termux which is viewed in a watch. Kinda difficult to explain. But Copilot says: Provide a single-line weather summary (temperature, wind direction name + degrees, wind speed, symbol text) for use elsewhere (repo name suggests it’s for a clock/display). https://github.com/timonoko/Supersaa_kelloon https://github.com/timonoko/Supersaa_kelloon

Fluorescence 9mo ago

I love termux. I can run my normal terminal environment - tmux, fish, just, git, zoxide, yazi etc. and build rust apps. With decent auto-complete/fuzzy-search, it's very ergonomic for only needing a couple of key presses to get things done. I'm impressed that TUI apps like yazi/nnn respond to touch. It's a very viable app platform for those inclined. Out of curiosity, is there an equivalent on ios with that level of support?

nasretdinov 9mo ago
In iOS we can only use something like ish.app which emulates x86 and runs full Linux distro instead, with predictably much lower performance than Termux (due to JIT being banned in iOS apps), but without any restrictions Android has on the executables
- DrNefario 9mo ago
  I don't have an iPhone, but wouldn't UTM be better for that use case?
  - nasretdinov 9mo ago
    UTM can't be installed from the App Store unfortunately, and without a developer license you are limited to 7 days for each successful on-device reinstall
    - dudewhocodes 9mo ago
      Apple somewhat lifted the emulator restrictions on the App Store which means you can install UTM from here: https://apps.apple.com/us/app/utm-se-retro-pc-emulator/id1564628856 https://apps.apple.com/us/app/utm-se-retro-pc-emulator/id156...
      - nasretdinov 9mo ago
        Nice, I must've missed that. Downloading it right away :) Edit: well, it's also very slow unfortunately. I believe iPhone CPUs either don't support virtualisation or they don't expose it (edit #2: it's the latter). Either way, QEMU is struggling quite a bit, and due to it being a GUI it's even slower than what iSH could do

cfiggers 9mo ago

Termux is the first app I install on every Android device I get my hands on. It's astonishingly capable. I have a Bluetooth keyboard case for my Android tablet. All the time, I use Termux to ssh into my Linux machine over my home network and code on it in Neovim from my couch. I don't bother with the default notes app on my phone. Termux + Neovim running vimwiki and syncing to a private GitHub repo is way better. Most stuff you want at the CLI is in the Termux package repository. On the occasions when it isn't, you can install clang, make, cmake, ninja, whatever libraries you need, and build it from source. At that point most stuff just works. Termux is incredible and single-handedly keeps me running Android.

firecall 9mo ago
What keyboard case do you use? My android phone is a Pixel 8 and that sounds cool :-)
- cfiggers 9mo ago
  I actually have like, four different ones... :^))) I'm a bit of a keyboard fiend. The main one I use with my Android tablet specifically is a no-name brand, knock-off "magic keyboard"-style folio case that I got on AliExpress for like, 45 USD. I ordered the English layout, I received the Spanish one (which is mostly the same but had additional legends for Spanish characters). Le sigh. It's AliExpress, I didn't bother contacting support. For my phone, I have a really old Zagg one that was originally for an iPad. The iPad has long since died but the keyboard lives on. Woo! The main keyboard I type on all day at my desk is a Logitech Pebble K380s. It can store three different connection profiles, which can be either Bluetooth or Logi unified receiver. So I have one of those profiles set to connect to my Pixel 8 via Bluetooth (typing from that now). Makes toggling back and forth between that and my desktop very smooth. On a "real keyboard" (like this K380s) there's a dedicated Esc key. Most tablet folio cases don't have Esc. I found an app called "External Keyboard Helper Pro" that lets me rebind Caps Lock to Esc. That makes Neovim much more pleasant.
  - firecall 9mo ago
    Thanks for the info!

GlenTheMachine 9mo ago

“Extendible” —> extensible, I believe

PlatoIsADisease 9mo ago

I forget about how many Android only Apps I've used through the years. Emulators, fdroid, pulse wave generator(not sure if iphone has it, but they don't have aux ports anymore), termux, probably more... I don't think about it. That all said, I've heard news about Android getting degraded by Google to be more like Apple. Hope its rumors, but at least I had a good decade+.

nickjj 9mo ago

I use Termux to run SSH on demand, it's quite nice for rsync'ing files between my phone and desktop. The on demand nature of it is a major selling point to me. When I open Termux and run SSH it's up, if I shut down Termux, SSH goes away with it. That and I can use rsync which is a tool I've been using for syncing files for a long time. There's no need to run always-on tools like LocalSend or SyncThing, at least not for my use case. I have a little "sync" shell script on my desktop I can run to easily sync files "desktop TO phone" or "phone TO desktop".

sejje 9mo ago
Fwiw I use syncthing, but I don't leave it always on.
nisiddharth 9mo ago
There's an app "Material Files", there you can add SSH servers as storage locations and then copy paste files as if the locations are mounted in your phone.

bluebarbet 9mo ago

Honest question, as a heavy desktop TUI user who has had Termux installed for years. A terminal (emulator) is a keyboard-based environment. How on earth are all you fans making it work with a tiny touchscreen?

ezequiel-garzon 9mo ago
Sessions tend to be way shorter for me, but it's great to have.
poolnoodle 9mo ago
Tiny fingers or bluetooth keyboards
ifelsewhy 9mo ago
This is why I'm looking forward to the new Android devices with keyboards. I can't do anything productive on a touchscreen.
- deleted 9mo ago
  [deleted]
- dotancohen 9mo ago
  You might want to look at the S-Pen. I can not stand the on-screen keyboards with my fingers, but they are not so bad with the S-Pen. That's the only reason I still buy Samsung devices.
genezeta 9mo ago
Portable Bluetooth keyboard.
dotancohen 9mo ago
I often use a Bluetooth keyboard with Termux. But as a mechanical keyboard affectionate with a veritable museum of ergonomic and mechanical keyboards, the Samsung S-Pen is good enough for terminal work. I use SSH, VIM, and lately Org mode in Termux. If I'm at a desk I still use a Bluetooth keyboard, but if I'm out then the S-Pen is a fine enough substitute. Right now I'm on an S24 Ultra, before that a Note 10 Lite, and before that another Note 10 Lite.

Ingon 9mo ago

Termux is great - one of the ways I use it is to install the golang toolchain and compile/run connet.

anasrin 9mo ago

Best terminal emulator on Android, my day to day basis is note-taking (fzf, Neovim, Git) and SSH (when I'm too lazy to open up computer). Also you can build some CLI or TUI using Go and compile using Android NDK and run it on Termux.

firecall 9mo ago

There’s an app called Termux in the iOS App Store, but I’m guessing it’s not the same thing?

bryanrasmussen 9mo ago
no, it's not, termux requires low level access to the OS that iOS protects against.
- mrsssnake 9mo ago
  No, it does not have any more access than any other app, as it work on unrooted devices too. That said, it has to be compiled for older Android SDK level because newer levels prevent apps to run executables they downloaded on their own and not bundle with the APK, even isolated. Android may disable compatibility with the older SDK some day but for now it works.
  - bryanrasmussen 9mo ago
    sorry, it was my understanding that Android apps have lower level access to the Android OS than iOS apps allow, that essentially iOS apps are sandboxed? And that this was what was allowing Termux to do everything it did in Android.
alamortsubite 9mo ago
Termux is the best of Android and sadly there's nothing like it on iOS. I'd ditch my Pixel today for the iPhone that's sitting on my desk collecting dust if there were.

bear330 9mo ago

I also really like Termux. When I was developing https://github.com/nuwainfo/ffl https://github.com/nuwainfo/ffl (a tool similar to croc, but the receiver uses a browser and doesn't need to install anything), it was because I wanted an easy way to get things off my phone. I actually packaged ffl—which is pure Python—into an APE just to make it compatible with Termux. Although many people here use ssh, rsync, or solutions like copyparty, I prefer my own minimalist solution: just one binary to transfer whatever I want. Anyway, Termux is cool.

yjftsjthsd-h 9mo ago
May I also recommend https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46855265 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46855265

alance 9mo ago

Fwiw termux + rsync for android phone backup (eg rsync /storage/emulated/0/) will grab most things.

r17n 9mo ago

Everyone posting seems to love this. Can folks provide some of their use-cases?

pawelduda 9mo ago
I use it all the time to SSH into my workstation and check on long-running tasks, code, etc. - Using vim/neovim is way better than I'd expect on a phone keyboard, because you can move around faster with less keypresses. - My terminal sessions are wrapped in tmux, so switching between devices is seamless (tmux panes resize without any problems to match your device dimensions/aspect ratio as soon as you interact with the terminal - nothing ever breaks). You can do the pinch gesture to change the text size, depending on what you need to see at the moment. - Both devices are using tailscale, so all I need is cellular data connection. For low quality network coverage I use mosh, which makes the session truly unkillable and makes sure it will recover when the connection comes back, albeit I ran into some annoying limitations with text scrollback. With the recent development of agents, it becomes even more effective, since I can just open up claude session, type the prompt and have the agent do the heavy-lifting (mostly writing large chunks of code). This greatly compresses the amount of text you'd have to type and makes phone-only coding more viable than ever.
dhoe 9mo ago
It's my primary environment for anything code related (I'm not a developer by profession). Cheap tablet in vertical model, cheap keyboard, termux, tmux, Claude Code with instructions to offload anything more resource intensive to a 5$ VPS. I'll not claim it's perfect - occasionally Claude does try to run something that crashes termux, and the keyboard mappings are not ideal - but it's good enough that I haven't needed a laptop in over a year.
- bluebarbet 9mo ago
  >it's good enough that I haven't needed a laptop in over a year Not to single you out but I worry about this trend. As things stand, free (FLOSS) privacy-respecting computing remains all but impossible on the mobile platform. If now Termux is encouraging even geeks to abandon the desktop, that seems like a net negative.

Rygian 9mo ago

My usecase for Termux: most pictures get backed up properly into the home NAS, but the sync process sometimes skips a few [1] (which is exasperating, but here we are still not migrated to Immich). So I have a python script in the NAS that calculates the MD5 checksum of every photo and video, and generates a shell script that, when executed on the phone, will calculate the MD5 on the local device, and delete if it is equal to the NAS. The generated shell script gets sent to the phone, then I execute it from within a Termux window, pointing at the DCIM folder. I can free up tens of GB of memories with reliability in the face of a misbehaving sync algorithm. [1] https://help.nextcloud.com/t/auto-upload-is-skipping-random-pics/222184 https://help.nextcloud.com/t/auto-upload-is-skipping-random-...

thekoma 9mo ago
How come you don’t just send the md5s to delete rather than the shell script?
- vasco 9mo ago
  I guess it's a more flexible design that allows to change the criteria for deletions in the future. You still need to calculate md5s on the phone either way.
- Rygian 9mo ago
  That would definitely work too. What I like about my process is that there is only one source script (the python one) to keep around.
dizhn 9mo ago
That nextcloud issue is quite weird and people seem to have had better luck with the sync app downloaded from places other than the Play store. I personally would lose any confidence in the app and use a completely separate thing to do the syncing if that happened to me. I actually did use the nextcloud client on pc a while ago and it was kind of fickle in other ways too anyway so I stopped using it.
- 9mo ago

kqr 9mo ago

I have been using Termux to SSH to other machines for quite some time, but only relatively recently did I have a flash of insight: I can use Termux to write applications for my phone in Perl (!). A year ago I used it to solve Advent of Code problems on my phone during my work commute. It was lovely. I have also used it to get access to a resampling calculator and a mental logarithm trainer on my phone.

ce4 9mo ago

I use it for lots of stuff, remote scanning from an old Canon flatbed scanner attached to my NAS (powered by a really ugly phone-local bash script, nothing else), rsync, renames (or the like using one liners), ssh tunnels to different destinations (to circumvent IP blockages) and of course YT downloads (using the source git folder and running it using "python -m yt_dlp $OPTIONS $URL" - when it breaks, a git pull is all it needs most of the time, I also have local patches that are not upstreamed)

mimasama 9mo ago

I use Termux for my OTP implemented in a bash script, I trust oathtool more than an app.

bluebarbet 9mo ago
So do I and this is a legitimately great idea for Termux.

boneitis 9mo ago

Another nifty utility to use in tandem is scrcpy[0]. Inside or outside of Termux, it allows you to interact with your android device in general from the comfort of your main computer/laptop over ADB. It becomes a super multiplier for Termux when I don't want to deal with the hassle of connecting a separate keyboard to my android phone/tablet. (A heads up, I have to use the `--render-driver=software` switch in order for scrcpy to work at all on my laptop.) [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scrcpy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scrcpy

dizhn 9mo ago
You need developer mode enabled for this right? Do you use any banking apps? The one I want to use for NFC payments doesn't work when developer mode is enabled. I am wondering if this is a global thing.
- boneitis 9mo ago
  Ah yes, I'm pretty sure developer mode is required. My banking app works for logging in to check account balances, even despite having a rooted device. Though, I have not set up any kind of payment methods, Android Pay, etc.
qiine 9mo ago
> `--render-driver=software` Nvidia GPU? Have you tired `--render-driver=opengl`
- boneitis 9mo ago
  Intel UHD. Unless they changed the default sometime in the past year or two, it seems opengl is already the default. Oddly enough, it is working for me right now on that setting. It was a painful troubleshooting process when I first installed it that took me a long while to stumble upon the software renderer option.

meatjuice 9mo ago

Being able to use openclaw or github copilot remotely through ssh would be nice. I think there should be a dedicated interface though, typing into termux using on-screen keyboard is a real pain.

twism 9mo ago

I've tried Termux but use the old irssiconnectbot (https://github.com/irssiconnectbot/irssiconnectbot https://github.com/irssiconnectbot/irssiconnectbot) but with slight modifications over the years since its open source... along with an also modified hackerkeyboard (https://github.com/klausw/hackerskeyboard https://github.com/klausw/hackerskeyboard) to support my workflow which is heavy on emacs and GNU Screen. The colors/graphics seem to be better on irssi and can also handle all the emacs and gnu screen keyboard chords and escape sequences. I try every android terminal but nobody is really thinking about running more than simple commands.

_sinelaw_ 9mo ago

It even runs Fresh so you can have a mini VSCode-like experience on your phone (pkg update && pkg install fresh-editor)

ramblin_ray 9mo ago

What's the difference between this and Termius, especially for those who are just ssh'ing into their home machines?

smetannik 9mo ago
Termius is SSH client. Termux is basically a terminal emulator + package manager. You can run Node, Rust, Claude Code locally on your phone. As an example - I used it to do Rustlings every day I commute on a subway. NYC subways don't have mobile network coverage, so I can't just SSH there into a remote machine.

leephillips 9mo ago

I use it to run Julia on my phone: https://lee-phillips.org/juliaOnPhone.jpg https://lee-phillips.org/juliaOnPhone.jpg

eigenspace 9mo ago
Do you have instructions somewhere for getting this to work? I've tried installing julia on termux a few times with no success.
- leephillips 9mo ago
  I just downloaded the archive (from the usual Julia downloads page) for ARM on the phone and put a link to the binary in /usr/local/bin — same as on Linux desktop. But I did this in the proot Debian environment.
  - eigenspace 9mo ago
    Ah I see. Even after installing proot Debian I couldn't get juliaup to work, but I'll have to give it a shot manually installing the binary and linking to /usr/local/bin

1vuio0pswjnm7 9mo ago

Imagine Termux with a "VPN mode" so that privileged ports could be forwarded

ratrocket 9mo ago

Adding to the many other great uses of termux already here, the most useful lately for me is running Syncthing. After the "drama" with the Syncthing android client (my understanding: official development stopped due to onerous requirements from the Google, then the most popular fork was transferred to a new owner in a less-than-fully-trustworthy manner), being able to just run syncthing from the command line is a breath of fresh air. I highly recommend using Unexpected Keyboard along with termux (a recommendation I myself almost certainly got from HN).

kid64 9mo ago
I remember hearing something about the circumstances of that transfer, do you have a link/reference. Also, when you run Syncthing (the normal build I assume, without the Android wrapper), are you able to reliably prevent Android from killing it?
- ratrocket 9mo ago
  Last things first: on my phone I only run syncthing "on demand", so I can't actually answer your question. Maybe someone else can chime in? From the little I've brushed up against the issue you're referring to, I think there's a way to have it not get killed, but it seems like it might be a little bit of a hassle. On the transfer, here is what I could dig up: The github issue about it was deleted, but archive.org has copies: https://web.archive.org/web/20251215062049/https://github.com/researchxxl/syncthing-android/issues/16 https://web.archive.org/web/20251215062049/https://github.co... HN discussion of same (with another link to the syncthing forum): https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46184730 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46184730 Lobsters discussion: https://lobste.rs/s/urbcpw/potential_security_breach_syncthing https://lobste.rs/s/urbcpw/potential_security_breach_syncthi... (and here is the announcement that the official android syncthing app was being discontinued: https://forum.syncthing.net/t/discontinuing-syncthing-android/23002 https://forum.syncthing.net/t/discontinuing-syncthing-androi...) No shortage of reading if you have the time! I'm quite happy to be running just the "standard" package (although, yeah, I should've pointed out that I don't run in continuously on my phone...)

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bergheim 9mo ago

With how AI based dev is going, I'm guessing more and more people will discover and start using termux, tmux and the like. Typing on a phone sucks, but at least modal modes (vim) and unexpected keyboard[1] makes it somewhat tolerable. 1: https://github.com/Julow/Unexpected-Keyboard https://github.com/Julow/Unexpected-Keyboard

jatora 9mo ago
suffice it to say that you just changed my morning with this link lol. god i love this keyboard.
zahlman 9mo ago
I've been dreaming lately of a Switch 2-sized device with ergonomic handles on the sides, with buttons built into the handles that implement a chording keyboard (like how a braille writer works).
zem 9mo ago
wow, that does look like the perfect companion app to termux! thanks for the pointer.

pxc 9mo ago

Since no one makes Android devices with hardware keyboards anymore, I almost never use this kind of software anymore. After getting burned by a couple of Kickstarter phones hampered by half-baked software and total lack of updates, the only thing I could rationally conclude is that Android as a productivity platform is a lost cause. When Android was new, I very frequently used Termux and ConnectBot with my first few Motorola Droid phones. For a brief moment, I had a working phone with a great physical design only held back by an outdated chipset and being locked to Planet Computers' abandonware. I could touch-type at 80 WPM on an easily pocketable device! Termux shone there. So many things about Android were not just more exciting in terms of potential when it was new, but actively better: wider variety of hardware, widely unlocked bootloaders, no remote attestation, etc. Termux sadly feels like a painful reminder of that to me.

crtasm 9mo ago
There's two upcoming I look forward to seeing reviews of: https://www.androidauthority.com/unihertz-titan-2-elite-qwerty-android-phone-3634132/ https://www.androidauthority.com/unihertz-titan-2-elite-qwer... https://www.engadget.com/mobile/smartphones/clicks-is-bringing-its-first-smartphone-and-a-new-keyboard-to-ces-2026-182239003.html https://www.engadget.com/mobile/smartphones/clicks-is-bringi...
angra_mainyu 9mo ago
I have a tiny but very comfy bluetooth keyboard, though 90% of the time I use a keyboard with android I'm using my tablet (and it's easy to forget it's not a laptop).

kirito1337 9mo ago

the best thing ive ever downloaded on a phone

jFriedensreich 9mo ago

Important to note that termux, while it was always great and indispensable, is getting increasingly interesting now because android is getting full desktop mode at the same time as XR glasses (xreal, viture etc.) are becoming mainstream. You can have a linux desktop in your pocket everywhere without rooting, hacking or tinkering, just install termux and x11 server. While not all packages work, llms are increasingly powerful, just an example porting deskflow from a debian package to termux took about 4 hours max, something i would not even have had an idea how to start just 4 months ago.

antirez 9mo ago
I would bet the popularity is due to coding agents. For the first time you can continue the work without typing much but just inspecting the output and provading further guidance with relatively short messages.
- jFriedensreich 9mo ago
  I bet thats true, but that use case will be much much better served by the native vm based linux terminal, not sure what sandboxing you can use in termux.
fermuch 9mo ago
I use my Meta Quest 3 with Termux & Termux X11 to run full desktop apps, and it works like a charm. No emulation, too! Native ARM64!
- 1dom 9mo ago
  This is interesting! Do you have any more info? I just discovered sunshine/moonlight work surprisingly well on Quest 3 for remote desktop to linux, I'd not really considered Termux X11 natively though.

superjose 9mo ago

I discovered it 1 week ago. I don't know why I never tried this in the past! SSHing my machine and vice-versa! Just figured out that I could use my computer's terminal to send to my android's clipboard via SSH. Pair it with Tailscale and we have a beast!

goodburb 9mo ago

You can now run Docker images in Termux with Udocker/proot[0], the disk IO can be a bottleneck for large databases when using proot. Tailscale works with "--tun=userspace-networking" [1]. I had it running on an old phone as a Frigate server with a solar powerbank in remote area, using the 4G as a failover. The uptime is almost a week without solar. Attiny hooked to the power button and a photodiode on the phone flash [2] (blink per minute) used as a watchdog for shutdowns/hangs to hardware reset. The button cap is removed without disassembling the phone. Old phones are still more efficient than most off the shelf SBCs, especially under load. ~3W compared to 12W with a Pi5 in the same performance ballpark. [0]: https://github.com/George-Seven/Termux-Udocker https://github.com/George-Seven/Termux-Udocker https://github.com/indigo-dc/udocker https://github.com/indigo-dc/udocker [1]: https://tailscale.com/kb/1112/userspace-networking https://tailscale.com/kb/1112/userspace-networking [2]: https://wiki.termux.com/wiki/Termux-torch https://wiki.termux.com/wiki/Termux-torch

mikewarot 9mo ago

I use Termux to host my 11/780 VAX/VMS system on my cheap ass Motorola phone, thanks to SimH. Beware of one thing, though... if you upgrade Termux, or remove/reinstall, you lose everything inside that "linux" system. I lost my first VAX setup that way. 8(

devsda 9mo ago

I mainly use it as an ssh client and run network tools like ping etc. It is on the list of must haves I install on a new device. I just hope against hope that Google doesn't limit its functionality further and point us towards the new terminal app in the name of security.

maxamillion 9mo ago

Galaxy Tab S11, in DeX Mode, with the Book Cover Keyboard Slim, running Termux and Tailscale is a great companion device to ssh to any system on my tailnet so I can do real work on the road. So good. I donate monthly to Termux, you should too. :)

MarsIronPI 9mo ago

Does anyone know of an X server or Wayland compositor app for Android that gives each window its own Android window (or whatever they're called on Android)? IMO that'd mix perfectly with Termux for GUI apps. Yes, I know Termux-X11 exists but that app is a single Android window (again, I'm not sure if that's the right term) for all X windows. I'm wondering if there's an app that creates an Android window for each X window.

bitwize 9mo ago

Enjoy it while it lasts, folks. Android has since implemented restrictions on which binaries may be run from an installed app; any spawned processes must also come from binaries installed from Google Play. Termux is currently grandfathered in because it's still built against the last API version not to have these restrictions (28?). But it's only a matter of time before that version starts throwing "This app was built for an old version of Android and may not work properly on new devices" errors and then, stop working altogether...

qiine 9mo ago
I will not go into that good night gently.

RiceNBananas 9mo ago

[dead]

javier_e06 9mo ago

Termux and I have a love-hate relationship. Is my go-to app in my ARM based chromebook. Yet I am forced to upgrade the package manager to install git and other tools and once the package manager upgrades.. SSL library breaks. So you get ONE CHANCE to install your packages before SSL gets upgraded and bam! No more installations for you. I go to the usual places to look for fixes and it's like yeah yeah yeah. Try this.. tried? Still broken, beats me. That's what I get for sticking with 32 bit ARM chromebook. Lightning fast. Great battery. Old OS.

bhelkey 9mo ago

One downside of Termux is the package management as described here [1]. Some new phones have access to Android Linux Terminal [2]. It is similar to Windows Subsystem for Linux. Like WSL, Android Linux Terminal lets one use apt directly. [1] https://wiki.termux.com/wiki/Package_Management https://wiki.termux.com/wiki/Package_Management [2] https://deepakness.com/blog/android-linux-terminal/ https://deepakness.com/blog/android-linux-terminal/

spidermonkey23 9mo ago

I like to use with termux_xfce proot to use calibre on the go etc

chlorion 9mo ago

I have been able to do some light programming in elisp in termux in emacs on my moto g. My emacs config is now setup to detect termux and config itself accordingly which is neat. Also I have a wireguard vpn setup so that I can ssh between my phone and desktop computer via a VPS with a public ipv4 address. This allows me to just "ssh 10.0.0.4" to access the phones sshd, instead of having to deal with changing IP addresses and NAT traversal.