Your Terminal Is Burning Battery Like It's Mining Bitcoin
frr.dev
April 28, 2026
4 min read
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44/100
Summary
The MacBook Air M3 experienced significant battery drain while using the terminal, dropping to 15% after two hours of coding. Activity Monitor revealed that the Ghostty application was responsible for an energy consumption of 3,600 over the last 12 hours.
Key Takeaways
- GPU-accelerated terminal applications like Ghostty and Alacritty consume significantly more battery than traditional terminals, with Ghostty using 3,600 energy units over 12 hours compared to 125 for Brave Browser and 99 for Zoom.
- Modern terminals do not enter macOS's "App Nap" correctly, preventing them from pausing and leading to unnecessary battery drain.
- The default Terminal.app on macOS is more energy-efficient, using CPU rendering and consuming a fraction of the battery compared to GPU-accelerated alternatives.
- Users can configure iTerm2 to disable GPU rendering by creating a "Battery" profile, allowing for reduced battery consumption while maintaining functionality.
Community Sentiment
Positives
- Kitty terminal is praised for its ability to enhance user interface while consuming minimal resources, showcasing how efficient design can improve user experience.
- Vibe coding is celebrated for its creativity, indicating a positive view on innovative approaches in terminal applications despite performance concerns.
Concerns
- Using React to render terminal applications at 60FPS is criticized for being inefficient, suggesting that modern frameworks may not be suitable for all use cases.
- The reliance on JavaScript for terminal rendering is seen as a regression, highlighting concerns about performance and efficiency in contemporary software design.
- The trend of using verbose, LLM-generated prose is viewed negatively, indicating a growing frustration with the quality of AI-generated content.
