Well, Macs come with TextEdit, a default editor for creating or editing plain text files and other file types. As a plaintext editor, it does not automatically feature advanced options like syntax highlighting and code completion, and that’s the reason why a robust text editor is essential.
Whether you’re a beginner at writing code or a seasoned software developer wondering about making a pick for your digital swiss knife, here’s a list of the excellent HTML editors available for macOS.
1. Visual Studio Code
Visual Studio Code is a powerful free and open-source, cross-platform text editor optimized for building & debugging modern apps. It features a beautiful and themeable UI with a library of extensions for added functionality.
Feature Highlights
Intellisense
Built-in Git
Built-in debugger
Support for extensions
Syntax highlighting and code folding
Files, folders, & workspaces
Deploy software
2. Atom
Atom is the incredible electron-powered text editor built with HTML, JavaScript, CSS, and Node.js integration. It features a simple, customizable UI supporting several programming languages, Teletype for collaboration, and GitHub integration.
Feature Highlights
Free & open-source
Customizable user interface
Autocompletion
FIle system browser
Built-in package manager
GitHub integration
Find and replace
3. Brackets
Brackets is the robust yet lightweight modern text editor built with web designers and front-end developers in mind. Besides, it features focused visual tools and preprocessor support that makes it effortless to work with modern web browsers.
Feature Highlights
Free & open-source
Extension registry
Inline editing
Preprocessor support
Live preview
Support for extensions
Built-in W3C validation
4. Coda 2
Coda 2 is a premium text editing app designed for web developers. It houses features that easily edit code of live websites and access project files from remote locations.
Moreover, the developers are currently working on Nova. This revamped text editor is soon released with a lot more features than those in Coda 2, especially a more aesthetically pleasing UI.
Feature Highlights
Costs $99 (also available for free as a trial version)
Builtin WebKit preview with a web inspector, debugger, & profiler
Syntax highlighting & symbol parsing
Touchbar support
Local indexing
Plugin manager
Remote file editing using FTP
CSS overriding on live websites
Panic synchronization using private keys
5. Espresso
Espresso is an advanced text editor specially designed for Mac operating systems. It houses functions that allow users to write efficiently, code, builds, design, and publish software with features like CSSEdit tools, live preview, server synchronization, and native macOS design schemes.
Feature Highlights
Costs $99 with a free trial
Beautiful user interface
CSSEdit tools
Navigator tool
Server synchronization
Live preview with Browser Xray
Dynamo auto-building
6. BBEdit
BBEdit is an award-winning professional text editor specially built for software developers and web authors on macOS. It ships with features that allow users to design, search, edit, and manipulate code using Git and subversion integration, search and replace across multiple files, project definition tools, etc.
Moreover, BBEdit provides a free 30-day trial with all of its features, after which the app will be free to use forever with advanced features restricted to advanced users.
Feature Highlights
Costs $49.99
FTP and SFTP support
Git & Subversion integration
AppleScript
Support for macOS Unix scripting
Text and code completion
Search and replace
Grep pattern matching
7. Sublime Text 3
Sublime Text 3 is the best advanced cross-platform text editor designed to offer users a complete feature set for HTML editing, among other languages. Furthermore, it supports tons of languages with options for “Goto Anything, “character & word count, jump to symbols and lines, batch editing, etc.
Sublime Text is free-to-use without any strings attached, except a pop-up now and then reminds developers to purchase a license. A personal license costs $80.
Feature Highlights
Free (optional license)
Multiple color schemes
Syntax highlighting
Text rendering
Code folding
Incremental diff
Git integration
8. UltraEdit
UltraEdit is a robust, secure, and fast Mac text editor designed to supercharge web developers’ productivity with enterprise-grade features perfect for personal and business projects. It provides a free 30-day trial with a money-back guarantee.
Feature Highlights
Subscription starting from $79.95 per year.
Customizable, configurable themes
Fully integrated instant diff operations, also file compare, etc.
OS integration via command line & shell extension
Syntax highlighting and autocompletion
Digitally signed installers and binaries
Code folding and multi-caret/multi-select
HMTL live preview
Integrated FTP, SSH, and Telnet
9. CodeRunner 3
Code Runner 3 is the robust, lightweight, and multi-language programming editor with IDE-level code completion for macOS. It is specially designed to speed boost developers’ productivity with features like fuzzy-search, tab-selectable placeholders, documentation snippets, etc.
Additionally, Code runner is a paid app, but it has a free installation package that allows users to test the app before deciding whether to purchase.
Feature Highlights
Costs $14.99 for a personal license
Advanced code completion
Supports 25 languages out-of-the-box
Documentation sidebar
Built-in debugging with breakpoints
Multiple selections
Symbol navigator
Run with arguments & input sets
Code templates
Support for automatic indentation
10. Emacs
Emacs is the best libre extensible, customizable command line-based text editor with an interpreter for Emacs Lisp at its core. Additionally, it features a robust set of text editing tools with support for extensions that extend its functionality.
Feature Highlights
Built-in documentation
Content-aware editing
Real-time display editor
Syntax coloring for several file types
Experimental support for Cairo drawing
An optional graphical interface
Final Words
Well, you now know the top-notch options for editing HTML files on your Mac as developed & maintained by some of the world’s best companies. They feature themes, plugin extensions, productivity shortcuts, native support for third-party apps, and a resource-friendly workflow.
So, which one do you’ve installed on your machine? Well, feel free to share your user experience with us in the below comments section.