# crossterm-rs/crossterm

Cross platform terminal library rust

Repository: https://github.com/crossterm-rs/crossterm
Canonical: https://ross.abutalabs.com/products/crossterm
Homepage: https://crates.io/crates/crossterm
Language: Rust
License: MIT
License Family: permissive
Topics: cross-platform, terminal, tui, console, cursor, input, color
Last push: 2026-08-21T00:06:19+00:00

## Health v2 (maintenance only)
Score: 67/100 (v2, computed 2026-09-03T02:20:16.233290+00:00)
- activity 98, release rhythm 8, longevity 100
- inputs: {"age_days": 3164, "days_push": 13, "days_rel": 515, "gap_med": null, "n_releases_24m": 1}
- flags: none
- formula: round(0.45*activity + 0.35*rhythm + 0.20*longevity); archived -> min(score, 10)

## Adoption (not part of the score)
Stars 4195, forks 413 (observed 2026-08-28T04:08:38.862271+00:00)

## What it is
Crossterm is a pure-Rust, cross-platform terminal manipulation library for building text-based user interfaces. It provides cursor control, styled output, terminal management, and input event handling across UNIX and Windows terminals.

## Use cases
- build a TUI app in Rust that works on Windows and Linux
- read keyboard and mouse input events from the terminal
- colorize terminal output with ANSI, 256-color, or RGB colors
- move and hide the terminal cursor programmatically
- switch to alternate screen or raw mode for interactive CLI tools
- handle terminal resize events in a console application

## When to choose
- you need a pure-Rust terminal library with few dependencies
- you need cross-platform (UNIX and Windows) terminal support
- you want low-level control over cursor, styling, and input events
- you are building a TUI framework or interactive CLI tool

## When to avoid
- you want a high-level widget-based TUI framework (use ratatui instead)
- you need GUI windows rather than terminal interfaces
- you need terminal support on legacy Windows versions before Windows 7

## Facets
- artifact type: library
- maturity: stable
- function: terminal-ui, developer-tools, cli
- domain: developer-tools, cross-platform
- platform: windows, rust, cross-platform
- tags: tui, console, cursor, input-events, ansi-colors, raw-mode, alternate-screen, command-line, linux, macos

## Member repositories
- crossterm-rs/crossterm (main) score 67

## Provenance
- Observed fields: from GitHub, fetched 2026-08-28T04:08:38.862271+00:00.
- Health v2: computed from the inputs above; adoption is never an input.
- Inferred fields (summary, facets, guidance): AI-extracted, prompt v1, taxonomy v1, on 2026-08-29T18:22:34.723053+00:00, confidence not recorded.
  - readme: https://github.com/crossterm-rs/crossterm (fetched 2026-08-28T04:08:38.862271+00:00, sha fceaed902d8e)
  - registry_crates: https://crates.io/api/v1/crates/crossterm (fetched 2026-08-29T09:12:54.219016+00:00, sha 488d9f0cb305)
- Data as of 2026-08-30T08:39:29.467469+00:00.