Looking for a Mac text editor that opens faster than you can blink, colours every language under the sun and still costs exactly zero dollars? Meet CotEditor—the lean, native scratchpad Apple should have shipped in the box.
Why CotEditor Beats the Rest
Pure macOS DNA
Built in Swift/Obj-C for macOS only—no Electron bloat, no half-baked ports. It looks, feels and shortcuts exactly like Mail or TextEdit, so you already know how to use it.
Zero-launch Lag
Binary ≈ 5 MB, cold-start ≈ 0.2 s. Perfect for the “I-just-need-to-paste-this-log” moment.
Truly Open Source
Apache 2.0 on GitHub. Fork it, script it, or just watch it improve every month thanks to a living community.
Feature Cheat-Sheet
- Syntax highlighting for 50+ languages out of the box—HTML, Python, Ruby, Markdown, Swift, you name it. Add your own in two clicks.
- ICU-regex find & replace with live preview—great for log scrubbing or multi-line refactors.
- Split panes & minimap—view header and footer (or two files) side-by-side.
- Outline menu—auto-build table-of-contents from comments or headings; jump anywhere instantly.
- Character Inspector—pop up Unicode code-points, UTF-8 bytes, even emoji version.
- Scriptable macros—Python, Ruby, JavaScript, AppleScript, shell… bind any script to a hot-key.
- Incompatible-char scan—spot the one emoji that will break your Shift-JIS export before you save.
- CJK-first design—detects GB 18030, EUC-JP, Big-5 automatically; vertical text and proper line-height kept intact.
- Auto-backup & version snapshots—never lose a line, even if macOS restarts overnight.
- All settings live in a normal macOS preferences window—zero JSON/INI hand-editing required.
Bottom line: if you want the speed of Notepad++ with the soul of a native Mac app, download CotEditor now and never look back.