elio

Snappy, batteries-included terminal file manager.

Documentation

• Installation: https://elio-fm.github.io/install/
• Docs: https://elio-fm.github.io/docs/

Features

• Three-pane layout — Places, Files, and Preview side by side
• Grid and list views — switch with v, zoom the grid with Ctrl++ / Ctrl+-
• Keyboard and mouse navigation — browse comfortably either way
• Customizable places and devices — pinned folders and auto-detected drives and mounts
• Quick actions — Go-to, Open With, and copy-to-clipboard
• Trash management — trash, restore, or permanently delete files
• Duplicate Finder — find and safely manage files with identical contents
• Rich previews — text, code, documents, archives, media, and more; see Preview Coverage
• Inline images — rendered directly in supported terminals
• Archive management — extract and create common archive formats
• Fuzzy find — find folders and files quickly
• Zoxide jumps — jump to frequent directories from your zoxide history
• Kitty drag and drop — drop files into elio and drag them out in Kitty 0.47+
• Shell integration — install cd-on-exit wrappers for bash, zsh, fish, Nushell, and PowerShell 7.4+
• File chooser — use elio as the file chooser on Linux and FreeBSD
• Theming — full palette and file-class control via theme.toml

Installation

Arch Linux

Install from the AUR with your preferred AUR helper:

paru -S elio

Fedora

Enable the COPR repository and install with dnf:

sudo dnf copr enable miguelregueiro/elio
sudo dnf install elio

Debian and Ubuntu-based Linux

Configure the official apt repository and install with apt:

curl -fsSL https://elio-fm.github.io/elio-apt/install.sh | sudo sh
sudo apt install elio

Manual repository setup is available in elio-apt. To install without adding a repository, download the .deb package from the latest release.

The apt repository currently publishes amd64 and arm64 packages.

Homebrew

Install from Homebrew:

brew install elio

FreeBSD

Install the FreeBSD package:

pkg install elio

Nix

Run from main with Nix flakes:

nix run github:elio-fm/elio/main

Or install from main in your Nix profile:

nix profile add github:elio-fm/elio/main

Cargo

Install from crates.io:

cargo install elio

elio starts in your current working directory by default. Pass a file or directory path to open it instead.

[!TIP] Recommended: use a Nerd Font in your terminal so icons display correctly.

Image Preview Compatibility

Terminal	Protocol	Status
Kitty	Kitty Graphics Protocol	✓ Auto-detected
Ghostty	Kitty Graphics Protocol	✓ Auto-detected
Rio	Kitty Graphics Protocol	✓ Auto-detected
Warp	Kitty direct-placement protocol	✓ Auto-detected
Konsole	Kitty direct-placement protocol	✓ Auto-detected
WezTerm	iTerm2 Inline Protocol	✓ Auto-detected
iTerm2	iTerm2 Inline Protocol	✓ Auto-detected
foot	Sixel	✓ Auto-detected
Windows Terminal	Sixel	✓ Auto-detected
Alacritty	—	Not supported
Other	Kitty Graphics Protocol	Set ELIO_IMAGE_PREVIEWS=1 to enable

Preview Coverage

elio previews many file types:

• Text, source code, Markdown, logs, and structured data such as JSON, YAML, TOML, CSV/TSV, and SQLite
• Documents such as PDFs, ebooks, Office files, OpenDocument files, and Apple Pages
• Images, audio, and video metadata, with inline images, covers, and thumbnails when supported
• Folders, archives, comic archives, torrents, ISO images, and other container-style files
• Fonts, binary files, and other metadata-focused previews

See the preview docs: https://elio-fm.github.io/docs/previews/

Optional Preview Tools

elio works out of the box. Optional tools unlock richer previews:

• poppler for PDFs
• ffmpeg / ffprobe for media metadata and thumbnails
• resvg for SVG previews
• 7-Zip for more archive types, comic archives, and RAR support

See the optional tools docs: https://elio-fm.github.io/docs/optional-tools/

Using elio over SSH

elio works over SSH. For the best experience, use a supported terminal and install optional tools on the remote host.

Opening files with terminal apps works normally inside SSH sessions. Desktop apps may open files on the remote host or do nothing useful.

Shell Integration

elio can leave your shell in the directory you were browsing when you quit:

elio shell install

Restart your shell, then run elio normally. Press q to quit and move your shell to elio's final directory, or Q to quit without changing directories.

See the shell integration docs for uninstall steps, supported shells, and manual setup: https://elio-fm.github.io/docs/shell-integration/

File Chooser

You can make elio your file chooser on Linux and FreeBSD:

elio portal enable

This sets elio as the file chooser for your current desktop environment or window manager. Use elio portal disable to restore the previous file chooser, or elio portal status to check the current configuration.

See the file chooser docs for setup details and supported behavior: https://elio-fm.github.io/docs/file-chooser/

Configuration

elio reads configuration from:

Platform	Config file
Linux / BSD	~/.config/elio/config.toml or $XDG_CONFIG_HOME/elio/config.toml
macOS	~/.config/elio/config.toml or ~/Library/Application Support/elio/config.toml
Windows	%APPDATA%\elio\config.toml

Use elio --config FILE to load configuration from a custom path instead of the default location.

See examples/config.toml for an annotated example, or the configuration docs: https://elio-fm.github.io/docs/configuration/

Theming

Themes override elio’s defaults, so you only need to set what you want to change.

Platform	Theme file
Linux / BSD	~/.config/elio/theme.toml or $XDG_CONFIG_HOME/elio/theme.toml
macOS	~/.config/elio/theme.toml or ~/Library/Application Support/elio/theme.toml
Windows	%APPDATA%\elio\theme.toml

Use elio --theme FILE to load a theme from a custom path instead of the default location.

A few example themes:

Catppuccin Mocha	Transparent

Amber Dusk	Blush Light

See assets/themes/default/theme.toml for the full default theme and examples/themes/ for all bundled themes.

Theme docs: https://elio-fm.github.io/docs/themes/

---

Controls — press ? in elio to see current bindings, including overrides

Keys marked with * are configurable in [keys] in config.toml. Configurable actions accept one key, a list, or an empty list to unbind the action. See the configuration docs for full key syntax: https://elio-fm.github.io/docs/configuration/

Navigation

Key	Action
k / ↑ *	Move up
j / ↓ *	Move down
h / ← / Backspace *	Go to parent directory
l / → *	Enter folder
Enter *	Enter folder / open file or selection
g *	Go To menu (g top, d downloads, h home, c config folder, t trash; configurable in [goto])
Home *	Jump to first item
G / End *	Jump to last item
PageUp / PageDown *	Page up / down
Tab / Shift+Tab *	Cycle places
Alt+← / Alt+→ *	Back / forward in history
Ctrl+T / Ctrl+W *	New / close tab
Ctrl+Tab / Ctrl+Shift+Tab *	Next / previous tab
Ctrl+1–Ctrl+9 / Ctrl+0 *	Switch to tab 1–9 / 10

Search

Key	Action
f *	Fuzzy-find folders in the current tree
Ctrl+F *	Fuzzy-find files in the current tree
Tab (in Fuzzy Find)	Switch files/folders without clearing your query
Alt+D *	Find duplicate files by content
z *	Jump with zoxide directory history

File Actions

Key	Action
o *	Open focused item or selection with the system default application
O *	Open With chooser
! *	Open shell in current folder
a *	Create file or folder
d / Del *	Trash; permanently delete if already in trash
D / Shift+Del *	Delete permanently
r / F2 *	Rename / bulk rename
R / Shift+F2 *	Rename in editor
r * (in Trash)	Restore from trash

View

Key	Action
v *	Toggle grid / list view
Ctrl++ / Ctrl+-	Grid zoom in / out
. *	Show / hide dotfiles
s *	Cycle sort (Name → Modified → Size)
i / Alt+Enter *	Show item details

Preview

Key	Action
Shift+K / Shift+↑ *	Step page (PDF, comic, EPUB) or scroll preview up
Shift+J / Shift+↓ *	Step page (PDF, comic, EPUB) or scroll preview down
Shift+H / Shift+← *	Scroll preview left
Shift+L / Shift+→ *	Scroll preview right
V *	Show / hide preview pane
P *	Fullscreen preview

Selection and Clipboard

Key	Action
Space *	Toggle selection
Ctrl+A *	Select all
Esc *	Clear selection
y *	Yank (copy)
x *	Cut
p *	Paste
c *	Open the Copy to clipboard menu
Ctrl+C *	Copy items to the system clipboard
Ctrl+v *	Paste items from the system clipboard
- *	Create absolute symlink from yanked items
_ *	Create relative symlink from yanked items

Mouse

Action	Description
Click	Select item
Double-click	Open item
Scroll	Scroll browser or preview
Shift+Scroll	Scroll preview sideways

General

Key	Action
?	Open help overlay
Esc *	Cancel current task / close overlay
q *	Quit
Q *	Quit without changing the shell directory

License

MIT