warp-lite

An open-source Warp Terminal alternative for macOS — the same block-based terminal, without AI, without telemetry, and without a login.

warp-lite is a lightweight, privacy-first AGPL fork of Warp Terminal: a local-first, GPU-accelerated block terminal for macOS with no Warp account login, no bundled AI agents, no cloud onboarding, and no telemetry as a product requirement. If you want a Warp alternative that keeps the terminal and drops the AI platform, this is that fork.

Status: alpha, but usable on macOS. The current build is v0.5.5-lite, which folds in a large privacy-safe upstream sync (139 cherry-picked upstream improvements) on top of the lite base. It builds, launches, and ships as downloadable WarpLite.dmg and WarpLite.app.zip assets on GitHub Releases.

Latest release:

• Download the newest published build from releases/latest.
• Current build: v0.5.5-lite (upstream sync 2026-07; release publishing may lag the source branch).
• macOS artifacts: WarpLite.dmg (~120 MB), WarpLite.app.zip.

See FORK_NOTICE.md for the relationship with upstream Warp.

Why

Upstream Warp is excellent, but includes a large agentic-development and cloud surface that some users do not want in their terminal. This fork keeps the terminal core and progressively removes or disables the product surfaces around AI, cloud sync, billing, onboarding, telemetry, and account login.

Goals, in order:

1. Local-first. No Warp account required. No login gate for opening a terminal.
2. Terminal-first. Preserve the block terminal, GPU renderer, shell integrations, tabs, tab groups, panes, settings, themes, command palette, editor basics, completions, and markdown rendering.
3. Stay current. Regularly pull upstream Warp's terminal, renderer, shell, and bug/perf fixes via vetted git cherry-pick -x, while rejecting anything that would reintroduce telemetry, network calls, or AI/cloud/account surfaces.
4. Lighter over time. Remove AI/cloud code paths carefully without breaking terminal rendering or input.
5. Honest status. Some source modules are still present while the default build avoids their product paths. This README tracks that split explicitly.

What this fork is not: a closed-source repackage, an MIT relicense, or a project maintained by the Warp Team. The AGPL applies and cannot be downgraded.

Looking for a Warp alternative?

warp-lite is aimed at people who like Warp's terminal UX but not the platform around it:

• You want Warp's blocks, panes, tabs, command palette, and GPU-accelerated rendering — without AI agents in your prompt.
• You want a terminal that opens without a login or account, ever.
• You want no cloud sync and no telemetry: your commands and history stay on your machine.
• You searched for "Warp terminal without AI" or "Warp without login" and found mostly settings toggles — this fork removes those surfaces at the source level instead.
• You prefer open-source (AGPL), Rust-based terminal software you can audit and build yourself.
• You are fine with alpha software on macOS in exchange for a lighter, local-first terminal.

If you want the AI agents, cloud drive, and team features, upstream Warp is the right choice — this fork intentionally goes the other way.

Install

Download the latest macOS build from:

https://github.com/terzigolu/warp-lite/releases/latest

Use WarpLite.dmg, then drag WarpLite.app into /Applications.

The packaged app uses:

• Bundle identifier: dev.warp-lite.WarpLite
• App name: WarpLite
• Current bundle version: 0.5.5-lite

Current Shipped State

The current build is v0.5.5-lite.

Area	State	Notes
Terminal core	Works	Core terminal view/input/model files are preserved. Do not wholesale stub them.
macOS app bundle	Works	script/build-warp-lite-app.sh builds WarpLite.app.
DMG release	Works	WarpLite.dmg is published in GitHub Releases.
Warp login gate	Disabled	skip_firebase_anonymous_user is enabled by default. Startup, "skip login", and visible account/billing menu entry points are hardened away from Warp auth in the lite build.
Telemetry product goal	Removed/neutralized	Historical telemetry call-site cleanup is part of the fork; keep auditing before claiming perfect network silence.
Context Panel / Tools Panel	Removed from shipped UI	The experimental Context Panel was deleted from the app wiring in v0.5.1-lite after causing instability and stale data issues.
Codex / Claude Code notifications	Kept	These are intentionally preserved for the lite fork.
Markdown viewer	Kept	markdown_tables and markdown_mermaid remain in defaults.
Agent mode	Not a target	Agent-mode product surfaces should stay out of the lite app.

What Changed Recently

v0.5.5-lite — Upstream sync (2026-07)

A large, privacy-audited catch-up with upstream Warp. Fork point bc3fffa was 927 commits behind upstream d375729; 139 improvements were cherry-picked (-x for AGPL provenance) after a strict per-commit review. Selection rule: bugfix / performance / terminal-feature only, and rejected if the diff reintroduced any telemetry, outbound network client, or AI/cloud/auth/account surface. The applied diff was audited — no new send_telemetry, reqwest, Firebase, or GraphQL network calls were added.

• New feature: vertical tab grouping — group, rename, reorder, and move tabs between groups (upstream #11749, #11791, #11842, #11849, #11903).
• Performance: avoid cloning the whole file tree on view updates (#12221), async presentation on macOS (#11326), input hot-path cleanup (#10927), fewer redundant SVG rasterizations (#12104), fixed a WeakModelHandle zombie-handle leak (#11767).
• Stability / crash fixes: flat-storage RowIterator underflow after clear (#12085), secret redaction across multibyte UTF-8 (#9521), block up/down navigation (#10095), plus ~60 more fixes.
• Terminal / shell: tab CWD + git branch from OSC 7 escape sequences (#9279), empty zsh RPROMPT handling (#11868), Intel(R) HD Graphics 2500 added to the buggy-iGPU list (#11454).
• Editor / files: configurable code-editor line numbers (#10012), show-hidden-files toggle in Project Explorer (#9532).
• Intentionally skipped (6): upstream changes entangled with removed AI/cloud/auth code — e.g. horizontal tab-group rendering (needs removed AI imports), SSH/remote-auth transport, and the code-review discard-panic fix — were aborted rather than force-merged, to avoid dragging removed surfaces back in.
• Verified green with cargo check -p warp --bin warp-oss and launch-tested. Full lists: WARP_LITE_SYNC_GAP_2026-06.md and WARP_LITE_SYNC_APPLIED_2026-07.md.

v0.5.4-lite

• Removed the normal prompt's unsupported AI toolbar in the lite build, including Agent/Auto mode switching, auto (cost-efficient), slash AI commands, @ AI context, and AI file attach controls.
• Redirected hidden settings entry points such as Account, billing, teams, Warp Drive, and Warp Agent pages to the supported Appearance settings page.
• Kept CLI agent rich-input infrastructure separate so Codex/Claude Code notification and context surfaces can continue to work where they are explicitly supported.

v0.5.3-lite

• Refreshed this README to match the real v0.5.2-lite state.
• Hardened the no-login path so the compiled lite feature bypasses auth onboarding even if runtime flags drift.
• Hid or no-op'd remaining visible sign-up, upgrade, referral, logout, and anonymous-user menu/actions in the lite build.

v0.5.2-lite

• Restored skip_firebase_anonymous_user in default features.
• Fixed the regression where the welcome/sign-up modal still appeared and "Skip for now" attempted Warp/Firebase auth.
• Rebuilt and published fresh WarpLite.dmg and WarpLite.app.zip release assets.

v0.5.1-lite

• Slimmed default features.
• Removed the experimental Context Panel source/wiring from the shipped app path.
• Gated additional agent/cloud management UI surfaces.

v0.5.0-lite and earlier

• Gutted large parts of codebase indexing and AI-adjacent background work.
• Deleted or stubbed several AI/cloud peripheral crates.
• Removed large telemetry call-site surface from earlier phases.
• Preserved the terminal renderer/input stack after a failed over-aggressive stub attempt proved that compile success is not enough.

Removed From Source

These crates or app modules are no longer present in the current tree:

Path	Status
crates/integration	Removed
crates/firebase	Removed
crates/voice_input	Removed
crates/handlebars	Removed
crates/warp_js	Removed
crates/warp_graphql	Removed
crates/warp_graphql_schema	Removed
crates/command-signatures-v2	Removed
crates/serve-wasm	Removed
crates/prevent_sleep	Removed
crates/managed_secrets_wasm	Removed
crates/app-installation-detection	Removed
app/src/onboarding	Removed

Still Present And Needs Work

These modules still exist and should be treated as the next cleanup targets. Some are default-disabled, partially stubbed, or unreachable in normal lite flows, but they are not physically gone.

Path	Why it matters	Suggested next move
app/src/auth	Login UI and auth flow still exist in source. Startup/skip/menu paths are hardened in the lite build, but the module is not physically gone.	Continue shrinking or feature-gating auth UI internals after verifying shared AuthStateProvider consumers.
app/src/ai	Large AI UI/product surface remains.	Continue surgical feature-gating and deletion; avoid terminal core wholesale stubs.
crates/ai	Still a major compiled/source dependency.	Continue reducing agent/indexing/ambient modules behind stable APIs.
crates/onboarding	Still present even though app onboarding module is gone.	Finish crate-level cleanup if consumers are gone or can be stubbed safely.
app/src/billing	Billing UI should not ship in a local-first lite terminal.	Gate/remove visible and reachable billing flows.
app/src/voice	Voice feature source remains although crates/voice_input is gone.	Remove dead app-side voice surfaces or gate them out.
crates/websocket	Network transport crate still exists.	Verify consumers, then stub or delete if no terminal feature needs it.
crates/warp_server_client	Warp backend client remains.	Audit call sites and remove once auth/cloud dependencies are gone.
crates/managed_secrets	Cloud/secret product surface remains as a stub candidate.	Keep API only if required, otherwise delete.
crates/warp_files	Cloud/file integration residue.	Audit dependencies before removal.

Guardrails

The terminal works because its core was preserved. Keep these files off any broad deletion or wholesale-stub plan:

• app/src/terminal/view.rs
• app/src/terminal/input.rs
• app/src/terminal/block_list_element.rs
• app/src/terminal/view/
• app/src/terminal/input/
• app/src/terminal/local_tty/terminal_manager.rs
• app/src/terminal/alt_screen/alt_screen_element.rs
• app/src/terminal/model/

If a change makes the build green by replacing terminal rendering/input/model code with small stubs, that change is wrong for warp-lite. Verify with launch testing, not just cargo check.

Build

The fork keeps upstream's macOS build prerequisites:

1. Full Xcode, not just Command Line Tools.

2. Metal Toolchain:

   sudo xcode-select -s /Applications/Xcode.app/Contents/Developer
   xcodebuild -downloadComponent MetalToolchain

3. git-lfs:

   brew install git-lfs
   git lfs install
   git lfs pull

4. Rust toolchain pinned by rust-toolchain.toml.

Common commands:

cargo check -p warp --bin warp-oss
CARGO_BUILD_JOBS=4 cargo build --release --bin warp-oss
script/build-warp-lite-app.sh
rm -f WarpLite.dmg
hdiutil create -volname WarpLite -srcfolder WarpLite.app -ov -format UDZO WarpLite.dmg

Verification used for the latest release:

cargo check -p warp --bin warp-oss
CARGO_BUILD_JOBS=4 cargo build --release --bin warp-oss
codesign --verify --deep --strict --verbose=2 WarpLite.app
hdiutil verify WarpLite.dmg

Known caveat: full cargo fmt --check can currently fail because the repository still references disabled/removed upstream files. Prefer targeted formatting/checks until that cleanup is complete.

Branch Structure

origin/warp-lite/main         default branch; current shipped work
origin/warp-lite/sync-2026-06  upstream-sync staging branch (v0.5.5-lite cherry-picks land here first)
origin/upstream-tracking      read-only mirror/cherry-pick source for upstream Warp changes
upstream/master               upstream Warp source

Upstream syncs are staged on a dated warp-lite/sync-* branch, verified (build + launch), then merged into warp-lite/main.

Historical phase branches and tags may still exist, but the public state should be read from warp-lite/main, the tags, and the GitHub Releases page.

Release History

Tag	Summary
v0.5.5-lite	Large privacy-safe upstream sync: 139 cherry-picked bug/perf/terminal improvements, incl. vertical tab grouping, with all telemetry/network/AI/cloud changes rejected.
v0.5.4-lite	Removed unsupported prompt AI controls and redirected hidden settings pages away from Account/signup surfaces.
v0.5.3-lite	README refresh, no-login hardening, and remaining visible account/upsell action cleanup.
v0.5.2-lite	No-login hotfix; fresh DMG/app zip assets.
v0.5.1-lite	Default feature diet and Context Panel removal from shipped app path.
v0.5.0-lite	AI/codebase-index cleanup and bundle version bump.
v0.4.0-lite	Managed secrets/onboarding reduction work.
v0.3.x-lite	Context Panel experiments; later removed from shipped path.
v0.2.x-lite	Telemetry call-site cleanup, UI hiding, niche crate removals.
v0.1.0-lite	Initial default feature purge and first green lite build.

FAQ

Is warp-lite a Warp Terminal alternative? Yes. It is an independent open-source fork of Warp's AGPL source that keeps the block terminal, panes, tabs, and command palette, and removes the AI, cloud, account, and telemetry product surfaces. It is a Warp alternative for people who want the terminal without the platform.

Does warp-lite require a login or account? No. There is no login gate, no sign-up prompt, and no Warp/Firebase account flow in the lite build. The app opens straight into a terminal.

Does warp-lite send telemetry? Telemetry removal is an explicit product goal: historical telemetry call sites have been cleaned up, and upstream changes that would reintroduce telemetry or outbound network calls are rejected during syncs. Auditing continues before claiming perfect network silence — see Current Shipped State for the honest status.

Does warp-lite work on Linux or Windows? Not currently. Builds and releases are macOS-only. Upstream Warp's open-source drop is what this fork tracks, and only the macOS app path is maintained here today.

Is the AI code completely gone from the source? Not yet. Some AI/cloud/auth modules still exist in the source tree but are disabled, gated, or unreachable in the shipped lite build. The Still Present And Needs Work table tracks this split honestly; removal continues incrementally.

Is this project affiliated with Warp or Denver Technologies, Inc.? No. warp-lite is an independent AGPL fork and is not maintained, sponsored, or endorsed by the Warp team. The "Warp" trademark belongs to Denver Technologies, Inc. — see FORK_NOTICE.md.

License

• Source code: AGPL-3.0-only (see LICENSE-AGPL).
• warpui and warpui_core retain their original MIT license (see LICENSE-MIT).

Trademark "Warp" belongs to Denver Technologies, Inc. See FORK_NOTICE.md.