Products · Broad category
Terminal emulators
Raised as a usability problem by 196 people on Hacker News over 17 years (2010–2026), in 147 threads.
This is a broad category rather than one product, so its issues aren't ranked on the home page.
No issue was raised by at least 3 people in 3 threads this year.
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Every issue, all time, most people first
Typing lags because of noticeable input latencyUnreviewed
20102026- Typed characters appear slower than keystrokes, so input lags behind typing2026-08-25
- Terminal takes so long to open the user forgets what they wanted2026-08-03
- Terminal lags too much to send Ctrl-S in time to pause listing2025-09-03
Copy and paste don't just work; some shortcuts conflictUnreviewed
20102026- Each terminal app has different hotkeys, so users must relearn them on every system2026-04-29
- Ctrl-Shift-C mistakenly opens dev tools in browser when meaning to copy2025-11-04
- Ctrl+C can't be used to copy in the terminal because it sends interrupt2025-08-22
Must memorise arbitrary command incantations to get work doneUnreviewed
20102026- Shells lack onboarding and tutorials, so users struggle to learn them2025-02-09
- No help for casual users; no recommended path to learn commands, making it effectively unusable2024-01-12
- Shell user experience described as shitty and decades old2022-04-06
Can't select text with shift and arrows at the promptUnreviewed
20102026- Can't move cursor mid-line with mouse or arrows to insert text2025-02-10
- Can't edit typed text with a cursor or mouse; standard copy, paste and select shortcuts don't work2025-02-09
- Input line doesn't behave like a normal text field with mouse click and select2024-07-08
Dark blue text is hard to read on dark backgroundsUnreviewed
20102026- Default dark blue is unreadable on black background2026-02-18
- Dark blue text is hard to read on dark terminal backgrounds2023-05-28
- Default dark blue shade is hard to read, so the user must reconfigure it2023-05-06
Auto-scrolling hides the start of long error outputUnreviewed
20102026- Output keeps scrolling while the user is trying to read it2024-01-16
- Scrolling through man pages randomly fails to render some text, so important parts get missed2023-01-16
- Auto-scrolling hides the start of long error output, forcing manual scroll-back2021-10-21
Editing long commands means detouring through a text editorUnreviewed
20102026- Mouse-based editing of long cURL commands in terminals is unreliable2026-11-04
- Hard to edit long commands in the terminal, forcing a detour through a text editor2022-06-01
- Editing a multi-line command is a pain, and the shell falls behind GUI editors2021-07-14
Emoji, box drawing and ligatures render inconsistentlyUnreviewed
20102026- Arrow keys, text selection and colours behave inconsistently, making the terminal feel like an inscrutable black box2025-09-23
- Terminal lacks text sizes, fonts and graphics, forcing awkward Unicode-based UI drawing2025-04-13
- Terminal emulators render emoji, box drawing and ligatures inconsistently, with options that are often missing or unavailable2024-09-30
Default behaviors are non-obvious to newcomersUnreviewed
20102026- Some default terminal behaviors are non-obvious to newcomers and feel rough at first2026-02-21
- Default setup emulates xterm, making the terminal feel ancient2022-08-13
- Terminal's default page up/down and home/end bindings are irritating and need manual fixing2014-01-13
Scrolling large text stutters on Raspberry PiUnreviewed
20102026- Terminal scrolling is laggy and cannot follow the mouse precisely2024-08-11
- Text scrolling caused noticeable, frustrating lag and flickering before GPU acceleration2022-08-13
- Large text scrolling in terminal visibly stutters and lags on Raspberry Pi2021-07-11
Unreviewed issues were grouped by machine: Claude Haiku labelled each comment as a usability complaint, named what it's about and summed up the problem in a line, and a small model grouped similar problems. Nobody has checked them by hand. Expect mistakes.
The newest 50 complaints
- Mouse-based editing of long cURL commands in terminals is unreliable2026-11-04
- Instructions mention a Run button that doesn't exist on the page2026-10-22
- Typed characters appear slower than keystrokes, so input lags behind typing2026-08-25
- Terminal takes so long to open the user forgets what they wanted2026-08-03
- Can't paste text into the middle of a command already typed2026-07-30
- Shared terminal sessions force all viewers to the same row and column size, awkward on phones2026-07-29
- Hard to tell which agents need attention in split terminals2026-07-08
- Each terminal app has different hotkeys, so users must relearn them on every system2026-04-29
- Animated spinners at the shell prompt are distracting and obnoxious to the user2026-04-29
- Raw markdown in a terminal is hard to read compared to formatted output2026-03-14
- Hard to find the right agent among many windows; finished agents get buried2026-03-08
- Screen scrolls randomly while typing; cursor movement keys put input at wrong position2026-02-28
- Some default terminal behaviors are non-obvious to newcomers and feel rough at first2026-02-21
- Themes make some CLI and TUI apps unreadable, forcing per-app color tweaks2026-02-18
- Default dark blue is unreadable on black background2026-02-18
- Loses track of which agent sessions need attention across tabs2026-01-21
- Waiting a second for a new shell to start interrupts the workflow2026-01-10
- Easy to mistake which machine a terminal tab is on2026-01-06
- Terminal experience is poor for remote use on a phone2026-01-04
- Intermediate selections overwrite primary selection, forcing reselection to recopy text2025-11-04
- Ctrl-Shift-C mistakenly opens dev tools in browser when meaning to copy2025-11-04
- Arrow keys, text selection and colours behave inconsistently, making the terminal feel like an inscrutable black box2025-09-23
- Sometimes types a bunch of extra text with each keypress2025-09-20
- Terminal lags too much to send Ctrl-S in time to pause listing2025-09-03
- Ctrl+C can't be used to copy in the terminal because it sends interrupt2025-08-22
- Text selection in terminals is more annoying than needing Shift to copy2025-08-15
- Terminals capture keybindings by default, clashing with keys the user wants for other things2025-08-04
- Config options aren't shown, must consult man page, and typos go unreported2025-08-01
- Cannot select a single column of text in split windows, so selection is always whole-screen2025-08-01
- Monospaced text is hard to read and wastes space2025-06-24
- Terminal lacks text sizes, fonts and graphics, forcing awkward Unicode-based UI drawing2025-04-13
- Can't click to move the cursor, so editing long strings is painful2025-03-18
- Can't move cursor mid-line with mouse or arrows to insert text2025-02-10
- Terminal emulators emulate obsolete hardware with weird limitations, making the general experience awkward2025-02-10
- Shells lack onboarding and tutorials, so users struggle to learn them2025-02-09
- Can't edit typed text with a cursor or mouse; standard copy, paste and select shortcuts don't work2025-02-09
- Copy-paste shortcuts differ across terminals, so user must trial many key combinations2025-01-11
- Moving the cursor through a long command means holding the left arrow and waiting2024-12-22
- Colour-only status indicators are unreadable for colour-blind and blind users2024-12-13
- Hides warnings and important info by clearing it, or uses color-only cues that users can't see or copy2024-12-12
- Many programs use dark-optimized custom colors, forcing per-program color configuration2024-10-03
- Changing terminal colour themes requires tedious manual steps and editing config files2024-10-03
- Terminal emulators render emoji, box drawing and ligatures inconsistently, with options that are often missing or unavailable2024-09-30
- Terminal scrolling is laggy and cannot follow the mouse precisely2024-08-11
- Hard to remember line-navigation shortcuts; inconsistent between programs2024-07-10
- Hard to learn that Ctrl+A and Ctrl+E move to line start and end, took years2024-07-08
- Input line doesn't behave like a normal text field with mouse click and select2024-07-08
- Hard to locate the terminal window running nvim among many2024-05-27
- Selecting text copies the wrapped display lines, inserting unwanted line breaks when pasted2024-05-27
- Font rendering and character spacing look bad with full unicode or nerd fonts2024-05-22