A community-maintained port brings Notepad++ to macOS as a universal binary, preserving the Scintilla engine, plugin support, and 80+ language syntax highlighting.
Key Takeaways
The port replaces Notepad++’s Win32 front-end with an Objective-C++ Cocoa UI written by Andrey Letov, not the original Notepad++ author.
Runs as a universal binary supporting both Apple silicon and Intel Macs.
Core editing stack is unchanged: Scintilla engine, tabbed editing, macro recording, search and replace, and plugin support all carry over.
Free under the GNU GPL with no ads, subscriptions, or hidden costs; distributed via a separate website, not the official notepad-plus-plus.org.
Hacker News Comment Review
The port is unofficial and unaffiliated with the original Notepad++ author Don Ho; commenters flagged misleading framing in the MacRumors article claiming it links to “the Notepad++ website.”
Mac-native feel remains incomplete: drag-to-dock-icon does not work, closing the window quits the app, and standard macOS UX conventions are missing.
Commenters largely see this as a Windows-switcher nostalgia project rather than a competitive option alongside BBEdit, Sublime Text, or TextMate, which already cover this space.
Notable Comments
@LeCompteSftware: flags that “Notepad++” is trademarked in France and calls the article’s sourcing “unacceptable” for implying official provenance.
@sghiassy: tested the app and found it fails basic Mac conventions – no dock-drop to open, window close quits the process.
