Bento terminal is a full-screen workspace for one project, in the terminal: preview and edit files, read the tree, commits and working-tree changes, run builds, open a shell, and run a coding agent beside the preview — all in one keyboard-first bento layout. It is written in Go with Bubble Tea and runs in the macOS Terminal or Windows Terminal (Menlo, SF Mono, Cascadia Mono; no Nerd Font).

Site starkdroid.github.io/Bento-Terminal · Docs install, keys, layout · Releases latest

Install

macOS and Linux:

curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/StarkDroid/Bento-Terminal/main/scripts/install.sh | sh

Windows, in Windows Terminal:

irm https://raw.githubusercontent.com/StarkDroid/Bento-Terminal/main/scripts/install.ps1 | iex

The Unix installer puts the binary in ~/.local/bin; --with-zsh also adds that folder to PATH. The Windows installer puts bento.exe in %LOCALAPPDATA%\bento and adds it to your user PATH, so a new Windows Terminal finds bento. Flags, install directories, and the source-build path are in the install docs.

What it does

• Preview and edit. Highlighting, folding, and a save in place.

• Every change. Modified, staged, untracked, and conflicted paths, with patches.

• Your shell. Any command, run inside the project.

• Builds without setup. Detected tests, builds, and lint commands.

• Coding agents. ctrl+a lists Claude Code, OpenCode, Gemini CLI, Codex CLI, Copilot, Crush, Aider, and Cursor; install one or start it beside the preview.

• Find fast. ctrl+p filters the project's files; ctrl+f searches the open file.

Every build ships the same panes, keys, and behaviour. Only the shell the Terminal panel runs ($SHELL on macOS and Linux, %COMSPEC% on Windows) and the installer differ per platform.

Search, editing, changes, the terminal, build detection, coding agents, shortcuts, mouse, and layout are in the docs.

Develop

macOS and Linux:

go test ./...
make build
./bento
sh scripts/install.sh --from-source   # install the checkout, not the release

Windows, in Windows Terminal:

go test ./...
go build -o bento.exe ./cmd/bento
.\bento.exe
.\scripts\install.ps1 -FromSource     # install the build so `bento` works

go run ./cmd/bento is the quickest loop on any platform; it runs from a temp directory and touches neither PATH nor the repository. Cross-compile with make darwin-arm64, make darwin-amd64, make linux-arm64, make linux-amd64, make windows-amd64, and make windows-arm64; without make, use go build -o dist\bento_windows_amd64.exe ./cmd/bento.

The site lives in website/; its README covers the build. Issues and pull requests are welcome.

License

MIT. Copyright 2026 Trishiraj. See LICENSE.