Konsole

KDE's feature-rich terminal emulator, the default on Plasma desktops.

Verified facts: 3 of 3
Alternatives ranked: 5
Approved reviews: 0
Visits sent from here: 0

About Konsole

Konsole is the terminal emulator made by KDE and the default terminal in the Plasma desktop. It offers tabs and split views, profiles with their own shells, colours and fonts, bookmarks for directories and SSH hosts, monitoring that alerts you to activity or silence in a tab, search, saving output to a file and an SSH manager plugin. It integrates with Dolphin and Kate, which embed Konsole as their terminal panel. Konsole is free and open source under the GPL, and while it is primarily for Linux and BSD, builds for Windows and macOS are also available. Settings are handled through a graphical dialog rather than a text file. It is the natural choice on KDE desktops; outside KDE it pulls in Qt and KDE libraries, and it is not as fast with very heavy output as GPU-accelerated terminals.

Best for: KDE Plasma users who want a capable terminal with a graphical settings UI.

What works

Tabs, split views, profiles and bookmarks
Activity and silence monitoring per tab
Integrates with KDE apps like Dolphin and Kate

Why people leave

Pulls in KDE libraries on other desktops
Not GPU accelerated
Windows and macOS builds are secondary

Top Konsole alternatives

See all 5

1
Yakuake
Drop-down terminal built on Konsole for quick access on KDE.
66.5
2
kitty
GPU-accelerated and faster with large outputs.
62.6
3
Tilix
Tiling GTK terminal for GNOME-based desktops.
59.6
4
WezTerm
Cross-platform terminal with a built-in multiplexer.
57.2
5
Ptyxis
Modern GNOME terminal with container support.
55.3

Why people left Konsole

In reviewers' own words, from reviews of the apps they moved to. These are their opinions, not ours.

No switching stories yet. If you moved away from Konsole, review the app you switched to and tell us why.

Reviews

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Konsole: common questions

Is Konsole free?

Yes. Konsole is free, open-source software.

Is Konsole open source?

Yes.

What platforms does Konsole run on?

Konsole is available for Linux, Windows and macOS.

What are the best alternatives to Konsole?

The highest-ranked Konsole alternatives right now are Yakuake, kitty and Tilix. See the full ranked list for pricing, platforms and verified facts.

See all 5 Konsole alternatives

Konsole facts

3 of 3 verified

License: GPL-2.0 or later; Checked Oct 25, 2026apps.kde.org(opens source in a new tab); “Browse source code GPL-2.0+ Supported by: Agustin.”
Features: Tabs, profiles, monitoring, bookmarks; Checked Oct 25, 2026konsole.kde.org(opens source in a new tab); “Tabs Multiple profiles Silence and Activity monitoring Bookmark support”
Other platforms: macOS and Windows; Checked Oct 25, 2026konsole.kde.org(opens source in a new tab); “Other platforms: macOS | Windows Konsole is a terminal to run a command shell.”