Zed Editor - My honest opinion

#webdev #code #programming

Context

Recently I tried using ZED the new code editor which claims to be fast by using less system resources. On my new company I was provided with a Macbook air, since it old and still uses intel processors it was kinda slow. But it was usable. As a long time VSCode user, as usual I installed vscode and used, since node js takes some memory, vscode was laggy with my project. So I switched to ZED.

Why ZED ?

Zed claimed to be fast and performant, with less resource conception (which is true btw). And i thought it would be great, I installed zed, opened my next js project, Installed some extensions for React & Tailwind. I was good to go, until..

Why I hate ZED

It was OK using zed at first, since its a lightweight software I didn't expect it to perform much, but It was awesome, the suggestion was fast. But when I select a suggestion something else gets entered, likewise for autoimport, It didn't import the files, which I selected from auto import suggestion.

Even though I didn't expect a full grown jetbrains like editor, at least I expected it work with the features they given, why show suggestion If you can't even enter the clicked suggestion. Same for autoimport.

Using zed was like using notepad for me, I was simply writing my code, except zed has color theme, but notepad doesn't.

This was my experience with ZED, I assume since its a new software bugs like these are expected, and will be fixed soon. Sometimes I get too frustrated writing in ZED with their bugs. First of all I'm struggling with my bugs, I don't have luxury to enjoy other's bugs.

Conclusion

Even though I hate ZED as it is now, It was a life saver for me, It barely used any system resource which was a huge help. But still If you ask me, I prefer good old VI over ZED now.

ZED got a huge potential, and I think it will shine in future, and I expect them to kill VScode by next year. I would like to personally switch to ZED on all of my machines.