ziggity

Ziggity is an open-source terminal UI for Git written from scratch in Zig by Simone Arpe, released under the MIT license. It compiles to a single static binary with no runtime dependencies beyond the git command already on your PATH, and ships prebuilt binaries for macOS, Linux, and Windows. The project draws inspiration from lazygit's workflow but is not a port — every design decision where the two tools differ is deliberate and documented.

What It Is

Ziggity is a keyboard-driven TUI that puts the entire Git workflow — status, files, branches, commits, stash, interactive rebase, and the commit graph — into one terminal window. It drives plain git subprocesses (no libgit2), parses machine-readable output in a single pass, and keeps every slow or network operation off the interface thread so navigation never blocks. The project targets developers who want a lazygit-style experience in a dramatically smaller and faster binary.

Performance and Binary Footprint

The README benchmarks ziggity 0.3.0 against lazygit 0.62.2 on an Apple Silicon laptop:

• Binary size: 1.8 MB vs 17.6 MB
• Process startup (median of 30 runs): 2.9 ms vs 19.2 ms
• Resident memory after opening a repo: 3 MB vs 18 MB
• Git subprocesses to load the repo: 26 vs 38
• CPU time to open and idle 10 s: 50 ms vs 140 ms

Ziggity fans out eleven parallel loaders at startup (status, files, branches, remotes, tags, worktrees, submodules, commit log, reflog, stash, and more), all launched within six milliseconds of each other. The commit log loads incrementally as you scroll, rendered previews are cached, and background refreshes are scoped to what an operation could have changed.

Workflow and Key Features

The tool covers the full Git workflow without ever dropping back to the raw terminal:

• Line-level staging: enter a file to stage or discard individual lines or hunks, with an optional split view showing unstaged and staged sides simultaneously.
• Interactive rebase: a plan editor (i) lets you compose drop/squash/fixup/edit/reword actions with range select, then runs the whole plan as one rebase. Cherry picking, custom patch building, autosquash, and rebase --onto are all included.
• Async network ops: fetch, pull, and push run off the interface thread with a spinner; in-app HTTPS credential prompts handle authentication without an external helper.
• Diffing mode: press W on any branch or commit to mark it as a diff base; the title tracks the comparison in git's own notation (main..feature, main...feature for merge-base view).
• Word-level diff highlighting: changed words get a stronger background rather than whole-line coloring, matching the behavior of delta, GitHub, and VS Code.
• Recent repositories switcher (ctrl+r): jump between repos without restarting.
• Stash keep variant: snapshot everything including untracked files into a stash while leaving the working tree untouched.
• Commit editor: live character count nudging the 50/72 rule, prepare-commit-msg hook prefill, and draft survival across dialog closes.

Architecture and Deployment

Ziggity is written entirely in Zig 0.16.0 and uses the libvaxis library for its event loop, layout, and rendering. The source is organized into focused modules: app.zig for state and actions, git.zig for subprocess wrappers and parsers, tui.zig for rendering, and supporting modules for staging, rebase, diffing, credentials, and more. The build produces a fully static binary (musl on Linux) with no shared library dependencies. Configuration is INI-based, loaded from a path in ZIGGITY_CONFIG or a per-repo .ziggity.ini; all keybindings and theme colors are remappable.

Update: v0.13.0

The latest release is v0.13.0, published on 2026-07-28. The repository was created in June 2026 and has seen rapid iteration, reaching 215 stars and 6 forks within weeks. The feature parity roadmap against lazygit is described in the README as complete, with a small set of known gaps: redo after undo, moving a custom patch to a different commit, editing the live rebase todo mid-rebase, and rewording in an external $EDITOR. Active development continues in the main branch.