Best Code Editor for C++

C++ is a very popular & widely used programming language. Almost every student with programming background knows about this amazing programming language. It is taught worldwide in different schools and colleges, and is used in all the major services and product companies around the world.

If you are a C++ developer or if you are just starting to learn C++, then the first thing to do is, install C++ compiler and get a good code editor to write C++ code. In this article, we have listed down 10 best C++ code editors or IDE for you.

The following is the list of the best Code Editor for C++.

1. C++ Builder

C++ Builder is used to writing the C++ codes and compiles them at the same time and mainly used for building high-end C++ applications for Windows and Mac Operating System. It is Licensed for use until the individual revenue from C++Builder applications or company revenue reaches $5,000 US or your development team expands to more than 5 developers. It works on both Microsoft Windows & Mac

Highlights

• Easy and fast Debugging

• GUI Builder

• Profiling feature

• Auto-completion and auto Correction

• Class browser

• In-Built Compiler

• Supports refactoring( Renaming a particular text or file name in the entire project)

Link: https://www.embarcadero.com/products/cbuilder/starter

2. MonoDevelop

MonoDevelop is one of the widely used IDE which allows programmers to write desktop and web apps for a wide variety of operating systems such as Linux, Windows, and Mac OS X quickly. we can simply create and run our c++ code easily in this code editor

Highlights

• Multi-platform Support ( Linux, Windows, and macOS )

• Advanced Text Editing ( Code completion support )

• It has Find & Replace feature

• Multiple language support (C, C++, C#, F#, Visual Basic .NET, and many more )

• Integrated Debugger (used for debugging the Mono and different native applications )

• In-Built Compiler

• Easy and fast Debugging

Link: https://www.monodevelop.com/

3. EMACS

EMACS is a text editor which is known for its extensibility & highly customizable nature. It is a free editor to edit our c++ codes. Emacs Editor runs on various operating systems regardless of the machine type. such OpenBSD,FreeBSD,GNU, GNU/Linux, , NetBSD, macOS, Microsoft Windows and Solaris.

Highlights

• Available for the various operating system

• Supports Unicode & syntax coloring ( One of the best feature )

• We can also write and compiling multiple programming languages codes like Fortran, Python, C/C++, Pascal, JavaScript, SQL Objective-C, Java Perl & many other programming languages.

• In-Built Compiler

• Supports Find and replace options

• Easy and fast Debugging

• We can easily customize EMACS with the EMACS Lisp code or using the graphical interface.

• Includes debugger interface

Link: https://www.gnu.org/software/emacs/download.html

4. Atom

It is a computer text editor for writing and compiling C++ programs. It has an integrated package manager, which is used to create our own package. Atom runs on the Electron. Electron is the framework that is used for building cross-platform applications easily and fast.

Highlights

• It supports various Operating Systems ( Mac OS X, Microsoft Windows, or Linux )

• Smart autocomplete and autocorrection for fast and effective coding.

• It supports multiple panes to split interface (we can edit and run multiple files at the same time )

• Find and replace options available

• It is pre-installed with 4 UI and 8 syntax themes. we can easily change the UI of the Editor

Link: https://atom.io/

5. Code::Blocks

Code::Blocks is a free C/C++ and Fortran IDE that is built to meet the most demanding needs of c/c++ programmers. It is a very extensible and fully configurable code editor, user can use it to write, run and build c++ programs without any problem easily

Highlights

• Works on a wide variety of Operating Systems such as Windows, Linux, and Mac OS X as well

• It is an open Source project

• It has a very fast custom build system

• It was designed to be fully configurable and extensible with all its plugins

• It Supports Compiling, Debugging of the code

• It supports Class Browser

• It Supports Auto-completion of code

• It has External customizable "Tools"

• Support Drag and Drop feature, so that we can easily move our code from one file to another or from one part to another in a same file

Link: https://www.codeblocks.org

6. Dev C++

It is a full-featured C & C++ Integrated Development Environment (IDE) for Windows Operating System. It is used by millions of students, developers, and researchers. It is mostly used in schools can colleges for teaching c and c++ programming. It is only for the Windows operating system and doesn't support other operating systems like Mac or Linux

Highlights

• Doesn't works on a wide variety of Operating Systems( Linux and Mac OS X ). It only supports Microsoft Windows

• It is extremely lightweight and portable

• Code Completion

• Integrated Debugger

• Class Browser

• Function listing

• It is an open Source IDE

• Customizable code editor

• It has a very fast custom build system

• Profiling support

• Edit and compile Resource files

• Tools Manager

• Find and replace facilities

• CVS support

• Available in 30+ languages

• It Supports Auto-completion of code

Link: http://www.bloodshed.net/

7. Anjuta

Anjuta is an amazing IDE with a number of advanced programming features which focus on providing a simple and easy user interface to the user with powerful and efficient development tools. It is an open-source project, It doesn't support all the operating system,it only supports Linux Operating System

Highlights

• Simple user interface

• It has various Plugins

• Valgrind plugin and gprof profiler plugins ( The integrated Valgrind plugin can be used to profile programs for memory leaks and various corruptions)

• Integrated Debugger

• It Supports Auto indentation (The editor can indent the current line or a selection of lines according to your indentation settings)

• Supports Bookmarks(We can set or unset the bookmarks for conveniently navigating to frequent destinations in your source code )

• Integrated Glade User Interface Designer

• Customizable code editor

• It has a very fast custom build system

• Source Code Editor

• Text zooming(We can zoom (change the editor font size) using the scroll wheel or using the menu commands)

• Edit and compile Resource files

• Class Inheritance Diagram ( Class inheritance diagram plugin allows to view inheritance hierarchy of all classes in the project. Each class can be individually expanded for more members' detail and facilitate navigating to their respective implementations)

• Powerful search and replace(The editor supports searching for strings and regular expressions, searching in files or searching all files in your project)

• CVS support

• It has an integrated Devhelp API Help Browser ( we can easily found the solution of a particular problem )

• Class Generator and File Wizard ( With the class generator plugin, you can create C++ and GObject classes easily and add them to your projects. Similarly, the file wizard can create templates for new source files)

Link: http://anjuta.org/

8. CLion

Clion or sea-lion is one of the best-paid IDE with very advanced programming features for building c and c++ applications easily and effectively. It supports all the 3 major operating system which are Windows, Mac, and Linux

Highlights

• Paid IDE with a free 30-day trial

• 64-bit versions of Microsoft Windows 10, 8 or macOS 10.13 or higher or GNOME or KDE desktop

• 2 GB RAM minimum, 8 GB RAM recommended

• Smart editor (It is used to analyzes the context and understands the project so that we can you can code faster.)

• Integrated Debugger

• It also supports Auto indentation (The editor can indent the current line or selection of the lines according to your indentation settings)

• Code generation & refactorings ( generates code for our project: such as getters/setters constructor/destructor also support refactorings to improve and clean up your code at the speed )

• Simple and clean user interface

• Source Code Editor

• Text zooming(We can zoom (change the font size of the editor ) using the scroll wheel or using the menu commands)

• CMake support ( CMake is a very famous cross-platform build system, which is widely used for C & C++ projects)

• Code documentation

• VCS integration and local history ( local history is very usefully it will save us from unexpected accidents such as accidental program termination, power cut, or other system failures )

• Unit testing (It supports the Google Test, Boost. Test & Catch frameworks & also provides a built-in test runner together with a powerful UI to easily investigate the test results)

Link: https://www.jetbrains.com/clion/

9. K Develop

K Develop is free and open-source software which we can use to write various programming language codes and it supports all the 3 major operating system which are Windows, Mac, and Linux. it has all the features of a modern Code Editor

Highlights

• Free and open-source IDE

• Fast startup and very small memory footprint

• Unit test integration

• Code formatter support (several predefined for C/C++ and Python)

• Semantic highlighting

• It has file and project templates ( we can add extra templates by downloading and installing them)

• Console tool view

• Support to reorder, enable or disable any of the buttons in the menu bar

• External script support

• Vim compatible input mode

• Documentation integration ( we can simply open a documentation page by simply hovering a symbol and then selecting the Show documentation for )

• Highly Customizable

• It supports Python, C/C++, JavaScript, PHP, and other languages

• We can assign shortcuts to almost each and every action in the K Develop

• Freely configurable color scheme, separately for application & editor.

Link: https://www.kdevelop.org/

10. Borland Turbo C

It is one of the most viewed and used compilers for c and c++. it is the first code editor of most of the c and c++ programmers. Most of the school and college computer labs computers have this amazing software installed.

Highlights

• Free software

• Only supports Microsoft Windows

• It supports Code Highlighting Feature

• Inbuilt offline help for different header files and methods

• Various header file functions examples inbuilt

• Doesn't support the cut/copy and paste feature from the external files

• No Refactoring Support

• Can't change the theme and looks of the IDE

• Small in Size

• Now Turbo C is discontinued

Conclusion

The above Code Editors can be used to write, compile and run C++ programs. So choose the best C++ code editor from the above list and use it to speed up your C++ learning journey.