herbstluftwm/herbstluftwm

Health v2 · maintenance only

Flags: no_releases no_license no_readme

Adoption not part of the score

1163 stars · 85 forks observed · 2026-08-28

What it is AI-extracted, prompt v1, taxonomy v1, 2026-08-30, confidence not recorded

herbstluftwm is a manual tiling window manager for the X11 window system, written in C++. Configuration happens at runtime via the herbstclient tool, so the config file is just a script run at startup, and all settings, keybindings, tags, and window rules can be changed live without restarting.

Use cases

• manage windows with a manual tiling layout on X11
• control the window manager entirely from the keyboard
• reconfigure keybindings and window rules live without restarting the WM
• split screen space into custom frames and virtual monitors
• mix tiling and floating windows on the same desktop
• script window manager behavior with shell scripts

When to choose

• you want a lightweight, scriptable manual tiling WM on X11
• you prefer runtime configuration via a client tool instead of editing config files and restarting
• you want flexible frame splitting and virtual monitors independent of physical hardware
• you like keyboard-only window management with a floating layer available

When to avoid

• you use Wayland instead of X11
• you want automatic/dynamic tiling without manual frame management
• you prefer a GUI settings tool or a batteries-included desktop environment
• you need extensive out-of-the-box theming and panel integration

Facets

application · maturity active

gui developer-tools desktop-applications operating-systems developer-tools cross-platform tiling-window-manager x11 manual-tiling keyboard-driven herbstclient runtime-configuration linux

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markdown · JSON · MCP: product_card(name="herbstluftwm/herbstluftwm")