Claude Code is fantastic. The terminal is… well… still the terminal. I know some people love it, but if you’re not one of them and still want to use Claude Code, Nimbalyst is worth a look.
You can download it here: https://nimbalyst.com/
Nimbalyst is a free, open-source visual workspace that wraps Claude Code (and Codex) in a GUI designed for agentic development. In plain English, coding agents in a much friendlier/advanced interface.
What’s Nimbalyst
Claude Code gives you AI superpowers in the terminal. Nimbalyst puts those superpowers into a visual workspace that makes complex workflows easier to manage — especially when you’re running several sessions, reviewing changes, or working with files that are not just code.
Some benefits/features:
- Visual Diff Review (See AI changes as red/green diffs in visual editors)
- Agent Session Management (easier to organize multiple parallel agents)
- Visual Editors: Work with markdown, diagrams, mockups, code, CSV, data models, and more
- Context Graph Link sessions, files, and tasks in one workspace
- Also claims to have a Mobile App that allows you manage agent sessions from your phone. Sounds cool, never used it.
- Git Worktrees. I spoke about it, over Cursor, here.
- Free & Open Source MIT licensed
- Extensible Supports extensions, including Themes, and custom workflows
Why I think this is cool
Claude Code is excellent when you want speed, focus, and directness. For quick tasks, the terminal is perfect. But once the work becomes more layered — specs, docs, mockups, several sessions, reviewing changes or not, switching branches, keeping context in your head without it leaking out of your ears — the terminal starts asking for a bit too much faith.
That’s where an IDE becomes interesting. It doesn’t replace Claude Code’s strengths. It gives them a more navigable home. I’ve been using Cursor, and I’m very happy with it, but… dude, Nimbalyst is almost the same thing, and it’s Open Source.
Super quick overview
Is it all about Claude?
Nope. I’ve never liked the impression of being tied to just one AI model and Nimbalyst. What if Codex gets better or more appropriate for my usage, and I’m used to this UI? Well… these people took care of this.
For the moment, there are 4 Agent Providers available for being set up in Nimbalyst > Settings > Agent Providers (Note: I’m on a Mac, the path is probably different on a Windows machine).
I’ve set up Claude Agent and OpenAI Codex with absolutely no friction. Love it!
onboarding and setup
The first thing you see is that Nimbalyst makes its intent obvious. It wants to be a workspace, not just a chat window with extra confidence. You start by opening or creating a folder, as you’d expect in a development environment, but the framing already feels more visual and less terminal-first. That matters. Tools teach us how to think while we use them.
The onboarding also makes a clear distinction between use cases and usage modes. Nimbalyst is trying to meet people where they are. This is what I thought, and I appreciated that. Later, I understood that this is much more powerful. Depending on what you’re doing, you can use different features and different window layouts… I also like that project trust is explicit. When we work with coding agents, permissions matter. A lot. Anything that makes trust and access visible rather than magical is a step in the right direction.
Extensions, tools, and MAKE IT MINE
For many of us, a tool only becomes home once we can bend it a little. Theme it, extend it, add the weird little thing we care about. Nimbalyst seems to understand that too.
MCPS
The first thing I loved is that Nimbalyst integrated all the MCPs I had defined for Claude Code!!
And displayed them in a nifty window where you can 1) edit them and (love this) 2) decide if these MCPs are global or just apply to a given project. That’s cool!
Nimbalyst is built on top of the VS Code ecosystem, so it generally supports VS Code extensions. That is very good news because it means you’re not entering a remote, isolated island with two coconuts and one plugin. To check whether a specific extension is available, go to the Extensions section (in the MAC Nimbalyst menu > Settings, and then the last section) and search for the extension name or ID.
The bonus that made me smile: Excalidraw extension is included by default.
If the marketplace is connected, it should appear and install directly. If not, there may still be another path through settings or manual installation depending on the extension.
This is also where the product starts to feel more like a real workspace than a wrapper. You can have conversations with the agent while still staying anchored in files, setup, and project-level context.
Themes too?
Yes, themes too. I also need my tools to look emotionally correct. So, setting up themes is a must: scroll down in the Extension Marketplace pane and paste a GitHub repository URL that contains a Nimbalyst extension. This works for both Extensions and Themes, and it’s needed because the extensions marketplace is still a bit underpopulated. Not in vain: the 1st Nimbalyst public version was released in Dec 2025, and the Open Source release under the MIT license has just appeared (April 29th 2026).
Heads up that once you’ve installed a theme, you need to go to Settings > Themes to activate the one you want.
A gift from uncle Raúl: A, short I know, list of GitHub repos with links to install them. Most of them are dark themes, but my fav is a light one: Rosé Pine Dawn.
| Theme | Author | Description | Link |
|---|---|---|---|
| Rose Pine | omartelo | “Soho vibes for Nimbalyst” | rose-pine-nimbalyst |
| Tokyo Night | bglti148 | Port of the Tokyo Night theme | nimbalyst-tokyo-night-theme |
| One Dark Pro | mrloc2026 | Port of the popular VS Code theme | nimbalyst-theme-onedark-pro |
| Sakura Mochi | JoaoVitorinoVN | Dark base with sakura pink accents and cool green structure | sakura-mochi-nimbalyst |
An interesting feature: Agent mode
For me, one of the strongest aspects of Nimbalyst is not just that it visually wraps Claude Code. It’s that it gives the agent work a clearer spatial structure. It’s like having Cursor + Librechat in a window, and all this with a unified structure and UI.
You can see agent tabs, context, instructions, and work areas in a way that feels much easier to parse than a long terminal scroll. When you’re doing complex iterative work, that difference is not aesthetic. It’s cognitive.
There are also different working modes depending on what you want to focus on: the agent, the file you’re editing, or a split view between both. I like this a lot. Sometimes you want to be in conversation mode. Sometimes you want to be in editing mode. Always you want to be in control of where to set your attention.
My take
Claude Code or OpenAI Codex are the engines. Nimbalyst is a more visual cockpit where you can code and manage agents.
In short, Claude Code is brilliant. Nimbalyst makes it easier to live with it and enables you to make a quick jump if any other model evolves enough to steal the crown out of Claude’s head.
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