I tried Neovim Distributions so you don't have to

🐦Twitter: x.com/typecraft_dev
Ever since the creation of vim in 1992 by Bram Moolenaar, there have been countless attempts at packaging up vim with configurations, and libraries, to give it a little more polish. For me personally, I remember using the Janus vim distribution when I initially got into vim about 10 years ago. For the most part, these distributions have been fairly straightforward. A couple libraries here and there, a cool colorscheme, and thats about it.
But lately, with the emergence of Neovim, and fancy new lua based libraries. Neovim Distributions have gotten more and more interesting. I personally don’t use a vim distribution, but I am curious about them. I guess you would say I’m “distro-curious”. There are; however, a LOT of distributions out there. So In this video I want to evaluate the 4 most popular distributions. Namely, AstroNvim, lunarvim, NVChad, and LazyVim.
Chapters:
0:00 introduction
0:45 hot dog rating system
1:52 LunarVim
3:28 AstroVim
5:25 NVChad
7:12 LazyVim
8:37 final results

[@mahirabbas3700]

thanks nerd

[@ragoonsgg589]

Idk why, but reading this made me laugh so hard I choked on a Zaxby's nuclear flavored traditional chicken wing.

[@mahirabbas3700]

no offence @typecraft but i'll stick to emacs

[@ragoonsgg589]

@@mahirabbas3700 my name is ragoons

[@earthling_parth]

From all us fellow nerds ❤

[@DarthVader11912]

​@@mahirabbas3700hell yeah

[@jaydubyasee]

Another 🌭 you could add is "How easy is it to override a default setting?". This is where I struggled with all these distros.

[@brentsteyn6671]

Exactly, this was the biggest turn off for me.

[@Heidelbeermarmelade]

Same here. This made me remove the lazyVim distro and going custom...

[@devabdul]

LunarVim is best for overriding default settings. Other distros use Neo-Vim API and functions for example vim.opt.number = true LunarVim offers builtin like lsp, treesitter, dap etc for example color scheme and others stuff, Open Lvim press c to open config.lua file. lvim.colorscheme = "catppuccin" Format on save lvim.format_on_save.enabled = true Kep mapping lvim.builtin.which_key.mappings["l"]["f"] = { Command, functions etc go here } LunarVim is smart it will give you suggestions, when you type lvim. also errors You can use vim API as well,

[@derschutz4737]

thats funny, i went from custom to lazyvim. Took maybe 10 minutes to get rid of their keymaps/plugins and use my own. The docs were pretty straight forward in my experience, what tripped u up?@@Heidelbeermarmelade

[@dragondove6197]

@@Heidelbeermarmelade lazyvim can be used just as a plugin, you can just import which parts you want from lazyvim. For me, it only takes me about an hour to convert my own configs to lazyvim. for disabling a plugin, you can easily do it like add a new plugin. e.g. return { "nvim-neo-tree/neo-tree.nvim", enabled = false" }

[@ryansmith616]

I love the short videos like this that just get to the point. Quick and easy. When I first dove into nvim distros, this is pretty much the exact experience I had. The only thing I would add is the Kickstart config that was in your poll. I wish more people tried kickstart first, Its extremely helpful for newbies. Anyways, Great video!

[@munzutai]

I think the "Neovim From Scratch" project is an amazing alternative for people who find distros like these to be too opinionated. It's similar to a distro itself but with the accompanying video series on KZbin, it walks you through configuring all the individual components that make a good editor. When you're done configuring, you'll have your own config exactly how you like it and you'll likely come out more comfortable with neovim overall.

[@KartikRao]

It was done by the guy who created LunarVim.. it is really nice playlist actually!

[@umop3plsdn]

chris@machine's old series actually fun fact he was the original creator of lunarvim

[@BigEyesLuigi1]

I originally wrote my own Neovim config by following the "Neovim from Scratch" but I found it too tedious to maintain everything. So I switched to LunarVim and turns out many keybindings and plugins are shared between the two projects 👍

[@oluwapelumi.adeosun]

I'll just follow your advice. I'm currently using lazyvim, and being new to all these makes understanding what's really happening difficult, I get confused on how to setup plugins too.

[@devabdul]

6:44 NvChad has pretty hard configuration mechanism, But NvChad is most well-written documents, as beginner or pro you will love it, (Best doc thn other distos)

[@akillercaterpiller]

Great video. Your 4 categories were exactly what I needed to make my pick and provided a great way to see them all side-by-side. 4 hotdogs!

[@nikfp]

This is great! Having built a config of my own that I'm happy with, I never felt the need to explore the distros. This video shines a light on the bright spots of the 4 I would consider and does it well. I think to get started quickly, any one of them would be a good fit for a new Neovim user. You have a new sub now!

[@typecraft_dev]

thank you! glad you liked the video. and yes I agree all 4 would be great for anyone new to neovim

[@retro_o]

How to work with buffers .. i usually jump with telescope to different files but then my whole system gets soo laggggyyyyyyyy

[@nikfp]

@@retro_o Telescope runs fast for me, even on my very slow old windows workstation that I use with WSL. But I also use Harpoon a lot and the built in alternate file feature.

[@sneakypython]

This video definitely deserves a Hotdog 🌭

[@darksinge]

Not to one up you, but I give it four hotdogs🌭🌭🌭🌭

[@Borch3Kawki]

Hello there! Greetings from Poland. Your work just give to my vim-experience second life. Some time ago I switched to MacOs and wanted to use vim. I tried regular vim and macvim, but then I came across nvim and later I discovered your videos. Great work! I really enjoy your talks. In the beginning using nvim was a little bit confusing to me, but then I found NvChad and it gripped me. However, after some time I felt I would love to have more control on what was happening behind the scenes in the configuration - and I ended up watching your videos on doing config from scratch. I watched them all, and I will do it for the second time as I see my understanding of nvim is growing. To sum up - your videos are both entertaining and full of practical information. You have your part in my return to vim! Thanks nerd :)

[@ChungusTheLarge]

Perhaps, the real Neovim was the Lua we learned along the way

[@typecraft_dev]

That truly is the real lesson

[@j1d7s]

Thanks for the great comparison! I would not have thought this could be done in a meaningful way in just shy over 10 minutes, but you really zoomed in on the hotspots. I tried all these distributions at some point, but in the end I started with kickstarter and heavily modified that, it has been months now since I felt the urge to change anything about it. (Well, it would be nice to get Kotlin debugging working...) I always get uncomfortable at some point when there is too much stuff I did not ask for explicitly, so the minimal approach feels best for me. I am thinking about even throwing more stuff out of my current configuration.

[@typecraft_dev]

thanks for the compliment! I agree with kickstart. that is a great way to get a solid custom neovim config going.

[@flightman2870]

since, installation, keybindings and js lsp are almost similar you could've avoided those tests or added few unique tests. the only test where things differ where on the adding new plugins.

[@jamesmackinnon6108]

I have found lazyvim to be great because when I made my own config I found it was pretty much just a worse lazyvim

[@pch9548]

lol can't agree more. Mine was just worst version of lazyvim with vim-plug

[@fedeanastasis7040]

I didn't know about Lazyvim, will check it in the weekend. Thanks!

[@comfysage]

lunarvim: *installation is a oneliner with a few prompts* typecraft: ill give the installation half a hot dog how dare they force us to type y+enter 3 times. letsgo archlinux minimalists, we shall rule this wasteland

[@mstr.alexandre2709]

I've heard a lot of good about Lazyvim, although the plugins config seems similiar to NVChad I can see how the extra folder it needs can throw people off. Which this video had been around when I first started. Mightve saved me a download or two!

[@thepisewigeon]

"Please don't hurt me chad" lmao, great vid as usual :))

[@TheS0meguy]

NO. It is actually really cool that LunarVim doesn’t mess with your Neovim configuration or do weird shit like automatically symlinking it to the nvim command, because that way you have an strict separation of concerns: if for whatever reason the configuration breaks and you’re unable to use LVim, you can still use nvim and go on with your life until you have time to get back and fix it. Also, the rest of the distributions mentioned here all of the overwrite whatever you’ve set for Neovim stepping onto each other - that’s what I’d call “messy”. LVim might not be the best Nvim distribution out there, but at least it keeps things nice and tidy. Also, being a longtime Emacs -> Spacemacs -> Doom Emacs -> SpaceVim user, I found LVim incredibly easy to pick up and be productive from Day-1.

[@derschutz4737]

If ur config breaks, its very easy to load vanilla nvim, literally just an argument to nvim. Also, thats what a .bak is for. they don't overwite anything unless you chose too, if u want no keymaps or anything then u can easily change it urself. took me maybe 10 minutes to change everything to match my old custom config.

[@redder-switch]

​@@derschutz4737for some people it is easy, for others it is hard. I have found the experience of using LunarVim quite easy because it takes a long time to work out what the best plugins are. With LunarVim you have your two commands lvim and nvim so you can switch between them if you need.

[@cazador517]

The vidoe is nice and conscise, but I hoped for something a bit more in-depth when you teaed the video.

[@typecraft_dev]

I totally get that. I can do deeper dives on specific neovim distros in the future

[@cazador517]

@@typecraft_dev That would be nice. I personally would appreciate an in-depth look at LazyVim, as it looks very nice but also a bit too magical (I'm saying this without having really tried it and also as someone who is rather new to Neovim). Also as the one with more hotdogs, I think that it's a logical next video to watch for those that landed in this video without any preference within the 4 distros

[@TheSast]

I think there should have been an "extras" section for neat cherries on too for each distro. I think that both AstroNvim and NvChad would've gotten a good grade there due to the plugin spec repository that is astrocommunity and the NvChad-specific plugins repectively.

[@typecraft_dev]

Oh for sure. I just wanted to keep this video as concise as possible, so I went by first impressions. I am aware there's waaaaay more to each repo and I only scratched the surface. Thanks!

[@tonyhart2744]

so which one the best do you think ??

[@josephosawe9227]

@@tonyhart2744I have used all and I keep running back to AstroNvim, I will clearly say astroNvim is the best of all.

[@comfysage]

to be honest most of the astrocommunity plugin specs are just the url of the plugin and nothing more. would have loved if it actually contributed to developer experience

[@TheSast]

​@@comfysage​only a minority (~20%) of the specs are bare and a basic linking to the related plugin with added lazy loading info, most of which are the colorscheme specs.

[@dungeon4971]

I think changing a keybinding or setting up new keybinding is a better metric compared to just which keybinding corresponds to what, but nonetheless nice video

[@shamus030]

Since they all use which-key, adding or changing a key binding would really similar in all of them.

[@ItsRyanStudios]

I've never been a fan of pre configured nvim. Even when I used vim, it never worked for me to use someone else's vimrc. By the time you understand everything in the distro and learn someone else's key bindings, you could have learned and built it for yourself from scratch

[@harleyspeedthrust4013]

agreed. most of the things that people use neovim for are available in stock vim, if you bother to look for them

[@bubbatom1530]

I don't completely disagree but lazyvim, for me is great because it's a good way to manage plugins. I don't know that there are really custom keymaps, mostly they are default for each plugin. I do agree that I have had to go back and learn plugins and add custom configuration. I think, even if I did it from scratch, I would end up with much of the same plugins and had a harder time organizing everything. It is a time cheat, but for me, it's been worth it.

[@Acorn_Anomaly]

@@bubbatom1530 Ok, there's a very important difference to make here, and I think you might be talking about something different. lazy.nvim is a neovim plugin that works as a plugin manager. LazyVim is a neovim distribution(powered by lazy.nvim) that sets up NeoVim as a whole IDE. I think you might be referring to Lazy/lazy.nvim, the package manager, and not LazyVim, the neovim distribution/setup.

[@thering0010]

I am 30 seconds in and already the chaotic energy has my chimp brain hooked

[@Bielocke]

Nice video. What is the terminal prompt you are using? thanks!

[@kiyov09]

Nice stuff! 🔥

[@carlmeyer96]

Thanks this was great!

[@rogersanctos]

For me Astro had the better fit. Installation is pretty ease; custom plugins and configurations is also one of the easiest I could found. It's just about to have a user folder inside the lua config folder and your customs are being to be loaded. Pretty much the same as Lazy in this point. Yet, the better is that you can look around in other users configs, grab some customizations and add to yours and in the end have all of your configs in your personal git repository for versioning and later use.

[@samarthnagar6988]

im using nvchad custom config by an indonesian guy and it works but i want to try kick start and make amy own config

[@abdelamdjidkidar4189]

thanks , you saved me a lot of time ... keep going , great video

[@typecraft_dev]

Thanks! If you want to try rolling your own setup, checkout my Neovim series - kzbin.info/aero/PLsz00TDipIffreIaUNk64KxTIkQaGguqn

[@Kaikaci07]

Great video, but why would you include keybinding discovery when all 4 distros use which-key and got one hotdog

[@hcblue]

Suddenly in the mood for a hotdog or six…

[@typecraft_dev]

Lol

[@LuisCassih]

Keybinding discovery section is useless when you reduced to only having which-key. I would do something like "How much under the hood keybinds have?" and along side this section I'd add "how dependant will make you to use this distro?". Having LSP Installed is pretty mandatory and is a useless metric, like which-key. The most important aspect of a distro is how far they went with their customizations, how many plugins has installed, how many default keybinds they overwrited. If it's possible to change their keybinds and how easy it is. Maybe you don't want to have Nerdtree and you want something like Lf, is possible to deactivate Nerdtree? Etc. So, with that in mind you can have a ranking of how heavy a distro is. Maybe someone is looking for a minimal distro with lazy, lsp, mason and telescope installed, with a ready to use nice structure so they can customize other plugins and don't need to have Noice or Lualine.

[@JacquesvanWyk]

I tried astrovim few months back and just got stuck but then again i did not know what the hell I was doing and kind of stop using neovim but new year and tried Lazyvim and boom all works. I still dont know what I am doing but installing plugins and gettikg around seems smoother. Thks video also helped to not worry anymore and stick to Lazyvim untill I am all grown up and do my own setup hehe

[@casperghst42]

Never been able to get neovim to work, happy that I can live without it.

[@BhEaN]

Great video as usual, thanks for sharing, nerd!! ;)

[@Mr.gluestick]

Rest in peace LunarVim you will be missed

[@pengie_]

i think end of the day youll need to learn a bit of lua and how your nvim plugin manager works, and how to configure lua settings in nvim

[@bubbatom1530]

It really seems like this is really light on real comparison points and information i.e. pros and cons of distro differences. You do an install, and mostly test things that are exactly the same. Only plugins are different. I feel like this is a good start, but it's just not really a comparison of these distros.

[@Irakli008]

It’s great to see these distros in action, but I just don’t understand how this needed to be a 9-minute video. All of them had straightforward installation, had WhichKey, had Mason, and differed in plugin installation. This specific set of criteria could have been a 20-second graphic. Would love to learn more about what makes each of these distros different, and to explore what the experience would be like for Vim beginners. It’s impossible to unlearn the common plugins and keybindings, but for a first-time user, actually getting over the hurdle of learning Nvim can be very challenging. Being beginner-friendly might not be the goal of all of these distros, but regardless, any documentation and guidance in learning how to use that specific distro would have been a great category to compare.

[@o_q]

doom emacs is my favourite nvim config

[@oliverfoxi]

Weird thing that I didn't have any issues with astro plugin installation. This whole thing with repo gives a unified way to store your configs. I have my own repo with config

[@aonodensetsu]

at this point my neovim config is pretty much a distro

[@Tobsson]

i would have gone with kickstarter, as it sets you up for creating your own config in the long run.

[@ForeverZer0]

I agree, it is perfect for a beginner who wants to learn how to configure it, not just accept what someone else chose for them. That is one problem overlooked by using a distro as a total beginner. While it is important to start with a base you can work from, it is equally important that you be able to learn/understand how configuration works, which kickstart is perfect for. Distros obviously tend to enforce their own way of structuring the config, which can be rigid and not translate well outside of that particular distro.

[@clockblower6414]

What is LSP used for ? Im kind of green to coding and just use my nvim config for corrections , line numbers, autoclosing brackets. I have only written in Python and bash before so Idk what the LSP would be used for

[@NavyDevy]

Lsp its code autocomplitions Like You write ~ pr (Suggests print) enter and now its just became print

[@NavyDevy]

language server protocol

[@NavyDevy]

Im not very good in explaining

[@TheQxY]

Honestly, if you're green to coding. Just use VS Code with Python plugin (or maybe there is build in support?) then you also have an LSP. This way you can focus on learning to code, instead of wasting time on configuring neovim.

[@NavyDevy]

@@TheQxY go load lazyvim lol, its just like 10 seconds and ready to use(node js can be needed) , vscode autocompletions is works similary

[@hglbrg]

Yep, you picked the right winner. Have a like.

[@user-fb1ri9hu8o]

I can't seem to copy text in nvChad and paste in firefox or any other place. any solution ?

[@SaMusz73]

Did you try the registers ? (bare vim fonctionnality)

[@typecraft_dev]

Which distro is your favorite?

[@ludwig8841]

my own

[@roskapostit2609]

LunarVim. No doubt. IDE is a tool not a life.

[@devabdul]

My favorite is LunarVim. And nv-ide (which is not a famous distro but its great ) Second my favorite is NvChad 🗿 which is Cool

[@bobbybobsen123]

Kickstart.nvim

[@svor1988]

space-vim (made by author of vim-which-key). Not a big userbase but the design principles meet my criteria, e.g. fast load time and response time. Keybinding config merging for each module (plugin-set config) is difficult to consider. LSP made things much better.

[@onelazyowl]

You took half hot dog from LunarVim for being thoughtful and not overwrite your base Neovim installation! This feels wrong man ...

[@svor1988]

I'm also most impressed with Shougo's work, e.g. shougo/dein.vim and shougo/dpp.vim. These are not zero-config plugin managers but the extent of customization is where the utility of a Vim distro (verses handwriting vimrc) would shine, where you don't have to configure everything to get e.g. minimal load time. I think due to time requirement when handwriting vimrc, using a minimal plugin manager like vim-plug is nesessary, but you miss out on perfection. So, I think that is a non-obvious selling point of a Vim distro that uses the sophistication of a complex package manager.

[@pamus6242]

Now this is a hobby ! I'm just tired of all the hyprland crap and desktop ricing non-sense. Those made a whole lot more sense when I had a sempron with 2GB back over a decade so awesome/xmonad + compton. So lets VIM. Lets GO !

[@riolly]

Really helpful

[@typecraft_dev]

Thanks!

[@MKOFT3N]

mac?

[@fuzzy-02]

Why do they all look like just... normal IDEs? So its either get nvim and add a vscode skin to it. Or vet vscode and add vim motions to it Though we can clearly see who has the better performance lol

[@damnhatesyou]

great now I want a hotdog

[@ameer6168]

Thanks to nvchad now my potato laptop won't have to suffer because of some electron crap code

[@typecraft_dev]

lol

[@Hellbending]

The only thing that flat out stops me from just using a distro is literally the ability to pass a straight up keys = false from the top level and just disable allllll of the distros binds. If they gave that? I’d have zero issue just using a distro lol.

[@matt92hun]

My favourite nvim distro is VSCode with the vim extension.

[@devopstoolbox]

Loved it! Thank you! 🌭🌭🌭🌭

[@typecraft_dev]

Glad you enjoyed it!

[@iamdozerq]

Where debugger?

[@electrolyteorb]

Typecraft: 🌭🌭🌭🌭🌭

[@jiggartala2008]

you're welcome ;)

[@srijonp4]

I Use nvchad

[@homohorrorincomprehensibilis]

what font is this?

[@typecraft_dev]

Meslo nerd font!

[@naranyala_dev]

next about new plugins

[@alacenimafaire]

Good video but I think it would've been more helpful if you highlighted the differences more since the video was basically repeating the similarities between them.

[@darkenblade986]

you should have also tested kickstart lol.

[@bobanmilisavljevic7857]

Newb question: is there anything wrong with just using vim?

[@typecraft_dev]

Nope not at all!

[@IuseArchbtw-di6cd]

vim is old, the vimscript also sucks atleast with neovim you'd be able to implement some lua configuration

[@tenuka22]

what key

[@ricardorien]

Explain Flutter for Neovim, please! It's so hard to config.

[@typecraft_dev]

ok maybe I'll make that video next!

[@Tekay37]

I'm hungry now.

[@canh25xp]

im going to use very scientific evaluation system ………… Using 🌭 metrics

[@jpdub45]

How you gonna flash teej like that and not tease kickstart 😤

[@typecraft_dev]

Love teej but I don’t see kickstart as a distro!

[@jpdub45]

@@typecraft_dev I see it as like the "blue bell homemade vanilla" of distros. Not too complicated, you can do a lot with it, and it still tastes pretty good on its own

[@typecraft_dev]

lol@@jpdub45 that sounds good! I have used kickstart before and like it

[@ivantodorov8850]

Nice one🌭

[@severgun]

What is the point of video if there is no comparison between built-in plugins lists. No hotdog.

[@pluraltest9242]

Try nvpunk

[@kobzarcheg]

LunarVim was the best but the maintainer leave the project so its dead.

[@kingcrimson123]

Lunarvim is still active and the latest commit in the master branch was 1 week ago

[@gorudonu]

great video but it lacks one category.... debugger!

[@treverparish]

I just use straight up vim. The other stuff is pure bloat.

[@devabdul]

The All distros is written in LUA. Lua is a best. But it has some limitations. But You can write your configuration in Rust, without limitations

[@brianteague8031]

I prefer Helix. Great out of box features.

[@redder-switch]

You will like LunarVim then. And the vim keybindings can be used in other apps like VSCode and loads of other apps that support it.

[@apina4]

They're somebody else's configs

[@efendibey965]

not very useful outcome, maybe interesting to someone new to vim and neovim but if you already familiar with vim this video fails to really compare these distros , yes they all use mason/whickey/lazy that's why theiir scores are the same. to make a useful comparison you have to dig deeper.

[@FrozenLeaves7]

1 🌭

[@richardbennett4365]

Nice video presentation. "Each criteria" doesn't make sense though. Each means one or a single item, so one can't use criteriA, because that is the plural form of criteriON. Thus, "each criterion" is correct.

[@VovaY]

IMO, LunarVim is the worst one. Running of the custom shell script doesn't look safe and doesn't allow multiple parallel configurations to play with. A lot of dependencies during the installation (for Windows platform it didn't work for me). But it has DAP from the box unlike others

[@vonPBDesign]

I thought the whole purpose of the "shell script" is to separate it from your other nvim configs. And as far as I know, that works well or did work well in the past

[@vaisakhkm783]

I have used lunarvim for about a year and even contributed to it... and yes, it's the worst distro The reason is, it was the first neovim distro to be made and which was long before lazy.nvim even existed packer is great for a perosonal config, but not meant for a distro, lunarvim was trying to get around that limitations of both packer and neovim's api's with it's special apis That along with it's creator chris loosing interest and moved in to cripto stuff didn't helped either...

[@redder-switch]

I had no trouble installing it on Windows. It lists all the dependencies on its website. The separate script means you can use neovim in its vanilla form, and lvim launches LunarVim.

[@ZombieJig]

How about spacevim? Influenced by spacemacs

[@MrTiagovla]

The title by itself is already idiotic; those are not distributions.

[@typecraft_dev]

Ouch!

[@richardbennett4365]

What??? The narrator's title is about you're not having to try Neovim distributions, because he did, but at 1:54 he recommends the viewer to try each of these four Neovim distributions. That's a complete contradiction of the title. Oh, my goodness. What???

[@anasouardini]

All distros are bad, especially lazyvim 🤮

[@gungun974]

I started with lazyvim, it’s was great except when I begin disabling things.., Then something occurred to me. Lazyvim just lazy.nvim, let’s learn this and pick what’s I like ! So thanks Lazyvim, maybe your internal function are a little too complex for me but thanks for the fish !

[@typecraft_dev]

For sure! It’s great to pick what you like from a distro when making your own config

[@derschutz4737]

How did you struggle disabling things? The docs are pretty straight forward in my experience. I recently went to lazyvim from a custom config (using lazy.nvim) and it took probably 10-15 minutes to remove a lot of their plugins and keymaps and use my own.

[@DogDog-pu8py]

Goated

[@allsunday1485]

I think this was pretty badly designed and it's so superficial I don't really see the point. Sorry bad, but you're awarding 1 hot dog for simply having which key installed, something all of them have, and the dame goes for the lsp.

[@MaxmillaBarroso]

thanks nerd