GNU nano

Website: nano-editor.org

GNU nano is a small, intuitive command-line text editor designed as a friendly, beginner-accessible replacement for Pico. It keeps the fundamentals simple — on-screen shortcut hints, straightforward copy/paste, and syntax highlighting — making it the default choice for quick edits and server configuration on virtually every Linux distribution.

Key Features

• Simple shortcuts — On-screen hints showing the available commands
• Syntax highlighting — Color coding for dozens of file types
• Line numbers — Optional continuous line numbering for navigation and pasting
• Search & replace — Fast find and replace with regex support
• Highly configurable — Customize behaviour via the nanorc configuration file
• Tiny footprint — Ideal for constrained environments and quick config edits

Platform

Linux, macOS, BSD, Windows

Licence

GPL-3.0-or-later (free software)

Website

nano-editor.org