{"slug": "gptel", "name": "gptel", "category": "ai", "category_name": "AI models and assistants", "description": "An LLM chat client package for GNU Emacs that supports multiple model backends.", "recommenders": 6, "commenters": 8, "warners": 0, "score": 5.237, "rising": -0.96, "first": "2025-12-30", "latest": "2026-10-28", "why": "Emacs users like gptel for sending LLM requests from anywhere in the editor, its extensibility with custom tools, and keeping LLM chats inside Org mode buffers.", "why_is_quote": false, "has_verdict": true, "sentiment": {"recommend": 8, "neutral": 4, "compare": 0, "warn": 0}, "spark": [0, 1, 1, 2, 1, 2, 0, 0, 0, 1, 0, 0], "listed": true, "loved": ["Extensible", "Works anywhere"], "caveat": "Not agentic", "short_quote": "I have since turned my LLM usage to gptel inside org-mode buffers.", "icon": true, "domain": null, "github_repo": "github.com/karthink/gptel", "official_url": "https://github.com/karthink/gptel", "pricing": "open source", "aliases": ["gptel"], "verdict": [{"text": "Emacs users like gptel for sending LLM requests from anywhere in the editor,", "cites": [{"id": 767028448, "item_id": 47939278, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47939278", "by": "iLemming", "date": "2026-04-28", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I like gptel because it's enormously extendable and exploitable", "excerpt": "Of course. I've tried different AI packages and currently gptel and ECA remain the main ingredients. This is a quickly changing landscape, and things may change, but for now it feels very good. I like gptel because it's enormously extendable and exploitable - it allows me to send LLM requests from just about anywhere - I could be typing a message (like this very one) and suddenly in need of ideas for how to phrase so", "context": "Emacs user", "use_case": "quick LLM requests from anywhere in Emacs", "switched_from": "", "story": "I have officially retired from Emacs"}, {"id": 792081713, "item_id": 49505107, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49505107", "by": "iLemming", "date": "2026-08-31", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I invoked (gptel-inline) - if the answer is short - I'd dismiss the popup", "excerpt": "Almost irrelevant to the story itself, but here's what it feels like to use Emacs these days. The story talks about monospace fonts and how unappealing they could be for reading prose. It is a fascinating post on itself, but here's what happened - it caught my eye while I was busy, I clicked the link, it opened the page, I kept it hanging around and forgot about it. Then HN page got buried in my browser history. Afte", "context": "", "use_case": "LLM chat inside Emacs", "switched_from": "", "story": "\u201cI just chose words carefully\u201d"}]}, {"text": " its extensibility with custom tools,", "cites": [{"id": 767028448, "item_id": 47939278, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47939278", "by": "iLemming", "date": "2026-04-28", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I like gptel because it's enormously extendable and exploitable", "excerpt": "Of course. I've tried different AI packages and currently gptel and ECA remain the main ingredients. This is a quickly changing landscape, and things may change, but for now it feels very good. I like gptel because it's enormously extendable and exploitable - it allows me to send LLM requests from just about anywhere - I could be typing a message (like this very one) and suddenly in need of ideas for how to phrase so", "context": "Emacs user", "use_case": "quick LLM requests from anywhere in Emacs", "switched_from": "", "story": "I have officially retired from Emacs"}, {"id": 750400048, "item_id": 46900003, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46900003", "by": "vkazanov", "date": "2026-02-05", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I did consult my LLMs advisor through gptel(https://github.com/karthink/gptel) with a few custom tools setup, which I cannot recommend enough.", "excerpt": "Actually, this is a copy of the older version of interface with a few lines dropped. I failed to generate a decent gif last night, will add a screenshot. Admittedly, while working on this, I did consult my LLMs advisor through gptel(https://github.com/karthink/gptel) with a few custom tools setup, which I cannot recommend enough.", "context": "", "use_case": "LLM client in Emacs", "switched_from": "", "story": "Show HN: Micropolis/SimCity Clone in Emacs Lisp"}, {"id": 742898688, "item_id": 46431168, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46431168", "by": "minikomi", "date": "2025-12-30", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "It's been good enough as a memory for me.", "excerpt": "I use gptel[0] with my denote[1] notes, and a tool that can search/retrieve tags/grep/create notes (in a specific sub folder). It's been good enough as a memory for me. 0: https://github.com/karthink/gptel 1: https://protesilaos.com/emacs/denote", "context": "", "use_case": "LLM memory with notes", "switched_from": "", "story": "Stop Claude Code from forgetting everything"}]}, {"text": " and keeping LLM chats inside Org mode buffers.", "cites": [{"id": 749075232, "item_id": 46817202, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46817202", "by": "ryanobjc", "date": "2026-01-29", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I have since turned my LLM usage to gptel inside org-mode buffers.", "excerpt": "I've used chatgpt-shell, but I have since turned my LLM usage to gptel inside org-mode buffers. Every day I use org-roam-dailies-goto-today to make a new file and turn on gptel (the use of org-roam-dailies is 100% optional). Then I do my interactions with gptel in here, using top level bullets and setting topics to limit context. I have 10 months of chats, and now I can analyze them. I even had claude code write me u", "context": "Emacs user", "use_case": "LLM chats in Emacs", "switched_from": "chatgpt-shell", "story": "Agent-shell: A native Emacs buffer to interact with LLM agents powered by ACP"}, {"id": 767027296, "item_id": 47939206, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47939206", "by": "minikomi", "date": "2026-04-28", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I use gptel and org mode when I was to be really hands on driving the development.", "excerpt": "Asolutely. It doesn't have to be an either-or. I use gptel and org mode when I was to be really hands on driving the development. It's a very different mode of interacting with models, and the way newer models are trained to play nice with harnesses makes them very obedient. https://poyo.co/note/20260202T150723/", "context": "Emacs user", "use_case": "LLM interaction in Emacs", "switched_from": "", "story": "I have officially retired from Emacs"}, {"id": 756858929, "item_id": 47303683, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47303683", "by": "spudlyo", "date": "2026-03-08", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "gptel (a simple LLM client for Emacs)", "excerpt": "I'm writing an essay where I get into how I use GNU Emacs along with gptel (a simple LLM client for Emacs) and Google's Gemini-3 family of models to turn a 1970s-vintage text editor into a futuristic language-learning platform to help me study Latin. I want to show how I liberate poorly aligned, pixelated PDF image scans of century-old Latin textbooks from the Internet Archive and transform them into glorious Org mod", "context": "", "use_case": "LLM client in Emacs", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: What Are You Working On? (March 2026)"}]}, {"text": " The one caveat raised is that it fits completion-style workflows better than agentic ones, which led one commenter to switch to claude-code.el.", "cites": [{"id": 804453009, "item_id": 50278313, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50278313", "by": "gpderetta", "date": "2026-10-28", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I have used gptel a while ago which was great for completion-like workflow, but abandoned when I moved to more agentic stuff.", "excerpt": "I'm using claude-code.el. What am I missing? (Aside from integration with other models of course). I have used gptel a while ago which was great for completion-like workflow, but abandoned when I moved to more agentic stuff.", "context": "Emacs user", "use_case": "completion-like LLM workflow", "switched_from": "", "story": "Emacs Turns 50"}]}], "praise": [{"label": "Extensible", "summary": "Commenters value how easily gptel can be extended, including with custom tools.", "quotes": [{"id": 767028448, "item_id": 47939278, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47939278", "by": "iLemming", "date": "2026-04-28", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I like gptel because it's enormously extendable and exploitable", "excerpt": "Of course. I've tried different AI packages and currently gptel and ECA remain the main ingredients. This is a quickly changing landscape, and things may change, but for now it feels very good. I like gptel because it's enormously extendable and exploitable - it allows me to send LLM requests from just about anywhere - I could be typing a message (like this very one) and suddenly in need of ideas for how to phrase so", "context": "Emacs user", "use_case": "quick LLM requests from anywhere in Emacs", "switched_from": "", "story": "I have officially retired from Emacs"}, {"id": 750400048, "item_id": 46900003, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46900003", "by": "vkazanov", "date": "2026-02-05", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I did consult my LLMs advisor through gptel(https://github.com/karthink/gptel) with a few custom tools setup, which I cannot recommend enough.", "excerpt": "Actually, this is a copy of the older version of interface with a few lines dropped. I failed to generate a decent gif last night, will add a screenshot. Admittedly, while working on this, I did consult my LLMs advisor through gptel(https://github.com/karthink/gptel) with a few custom tools setup, which I cannot recommend enough.", "context": "", "use_case": "LLM client in Emacs", "switched_from": "", "story": "Show HN: Micropolis/SimCity Clone in Emacs Lisp"}, {"id": 742898688, "item_id": 46431168, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46431168", "by": "minikomi", "date": "2025-12-30", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "It's been good enough as a memory for me.", "excerpt": "I use gptel[0] with my denote[1] notes, and a tool that can search/retrieve tags/grep/create notes (in a specific sub folder). It's been good enough as a memory for me. 0: https://github.com/karthink/gptel 1: https://protesilaos.com/emacs/denote", "context": "", "use_case": "LLM memory with notes", "switched_from": "", "story": "Stop Claude Code from forgetting everything"}]}, {"label": "Works anywhere", "summary": "It sends LLM requests from any buffer for quick, discardable interactions.", "quotes": [{"id": 767028448, "item_id": 47939278, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47939278", "by": "iLemming", "date": "2026-04-28", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I like gptel because it's enormously extendable and exploitable", "excerpt": "Of course. I've tried different AI packages and currently gptel and ECA remain the main ingredients. This is a quickly changing landscape, and things may change, but for now it feels very good. I like gptel because it's enormously extendable and exploitable - it allows me to send LLM requests from just about anywhere - I could be typing a message (like this very one) and suddenly in need of ideas for how to phrase so", "context": "Emacs user", "use_case": "quick LLM requests from anywhere in Emacs", "switched_from": "", "story": "I have officially retired from Emacs"}, {"id": 792081713, "item_id": 49505107, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49505107", "by": "iLemming", "date": "2026-08-31", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I invoked (gptel-inline) - if the answer is short - I'd dismiss the popup", "excerpt": "Almost irrelevant to the story itself, but here's what it feels like to use Emacs these days. The story talks about monospace fonts and how unappealing they could be for reading prose. It is a fascinating post on itself, but here's what happened - it caught my eye while I was busy, I clicked the link, it opened the page, I kept it hanging around and forgot about it. Then HN page got buried in my browser history. Afte", "context": "", "use_case": "LLM chat inside Emacs", "switched_from": "", "story": "\u201cI just chose words carefully\u201d"}, {"id": 754985777, "item_id": 47186611, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47186611", "by": "stephen_cagle", "date": "2026-02-27", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I do use https://github.com/karthink/gptel on my own machine, because it is just too damn useful.", "excerpt": "I use KVM/QEMU on Linux. I have a set of scripts that I use to create a new directory with a VM project and that also installs a debian image for the VM. I have an ./pull_from_vm and ./push_to_vm that I use to pull and push the git code to and from the vm. As well as a ./claude to start claude on the vm and a ./emacs to initialize and start emacs on the vm after syncing my local .spacemacs directory to the vm (I like", "context": "Linux user", "use_case": "LLM client in Emacs", "switched_from": "", "story": "Let's Discuss Sandbox Isolation"}]}, {"label": "Org mode integration", "summary": "Users keep LLM chats in Org buffers, where gptel-mode marks which text came from the model.", "quotes": [{"id": 749075232, "item_id": 46817202, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46817202", "by": "ryanobjc", "date": "2026-01-29", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I have since turned my LLM usage to gptel inside org-mode buffers.", "excerpt": "I've used chatgpt-shell, but I have since turned my LLM usage to gptel inside org-mode buffers. Every day I use org-roam-dailies-goto-today to make a new file and turn on gptel (the use of org-roam-dailies is 100% optional). Then I do my interactions with gptel in here, using top level bullets and setting topics to limit context. I have 10 months of chats, and now I can analyze them. I even had claude code write me u", "context": "Emacs user", "use_case": "LLM chats in Emacs", "switched_from": "chatgpt-shell", "story": "Agent-shell: A native Emacs buffer to interact with LLM agents powered by ACP"}, {"id": 767027296, "item_id": 47939206, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47939206", "by": "minikomi", "date": "2026-04-28", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I use gptel and org mode when I was to be really hands on driving the development.", "excerpt": "Asolutely. It doesn't have to be an either-or. I use gptel and org mode when I was to be really hands on driving the development. It's a very different mode of interacting with models, and the way newer models are trained to play nice with harnesses makes them very obedient. https://poyo.co/note/20260202T150723/", "context": "Emacs user", "use_case": "LLM interaction in Emacs", "switched_from": "", "story": "I have officially retired from Emacs"}, {"id": 756858929, "item_id": 47303683, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47303683", "by": "spudlyo", "date": "2026-03-08", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "gptel (a simple LLM client for Emacs)", "excerpt": "I'm writing an essay where I get into how I use GNU Emacs along with gptel (a simple LLM client for Emacs) and Google's Gemini-3 family of models to turn a 1970s-vintage text editor into a futuristic language-learning platform to help me study Latin. I want to show how I liberate poorly aligned, pixelated PDF image scans of century-old Latin textbooks from the Internet Archive and transform them into glorious Org mod", "context": "", "use_case": "LLM client in Emacs", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: What Are You Working On? (March 2026)"}]}, {"label": "Notes as memory", "summary": "Paired with note tools like denote or org-roam, it serves as a searchable memory and chat archive.", "quotes": [{"id": 742898688, "item_id": 46431168, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46431168", "by": "minikomi", "date": "2025-12-30", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "It's been good enough as a memory for me.", "excerpt": "I use gptel[0] with my denote[1] notes, and a tool that can search/retrieve tags/grep/create notes (in a specific sub folder). It's been good enough as a memory for me. 0: https://github.com/karthink/gptel 1: https://protesilaos.com/emacs/denote", "context": "", "use_case": "LLM memory with notes", "switched_from": "", "story": "Stop Claude Code from forgetting everything"}, {"id": 749075232, "item_id": 46817202, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46817202", "by": "ryanobjc", "date": "2026-01-29", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I have since turned my LLM usage to gptel inside org-mode buffers.", "excerpt": "I've used chatgpt-shell, but I have since turned my LLM usage to gptel inside org-mode buffers. Every day I use org-roam-dailies-goto-today to make a new file and turn on gptel (the use of org-roam-dailies is 100% optional). Then I do my interactions with gptel in here, using top level bullets and setting topics to limit context. I have 10 months of chats, and now I can analyze them. I even had claude code write me u", "context": "Emacs user", "use_case": "LLM chats in Emacs", "switched_from": "chatgpt-shell", "story": "Agent-shell: A native Emacs buffer to interact with LLM agents powered by ACP"}]}, {"label": "Language learning", "summary": "One commenter uses it with Emacs and Gemini models to study Latin.", "quotes": [{"id": 758246785, "item_id": 47390424, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47390424", "by": "spudlyo", "date": "2026-03-15", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I use an ancient text editor, GNU Emacs, along with gptel and some other tools to help me me study an ancient language.", "excerpt": "I've been retired for the last two years, it's been transformative. I've lost a lot of weight, I've greatly improved my cardiovascular fitness, I've finally treated my ADHD, I've learned Latin to an intermediate level, I've made new friends, I've gotten into 19th century literature, and as a life-long autodidact I have never been happier. Ultimately, I want to give something back to the world in the next 10 years. I'", "context": "retired for two years", "use_case": "AI language study in Emacs", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: What will you be doing for the next 10 years?"}, {"id": 756858929, "item_id": 47303683, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47303683", "by": "spudlyo", "date": "2026-03-08", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "gptel (a simple LLM client for Emacs)", "excerpt": "I'm writing an essay where I get into how I use GNU Emacs along with gptel (a simple LLM client for Emacs) and Google's Gemini-3 family of models to turn a 1970s-vintage text editor into a futuristic language-learning platform to help me study Latin. I want to show how I liberate poorly aligned, pixelated PDF image scans of century-old Latin textbooks from the Internet Archive and transform them into glorious Org mod", "context": "", "use_case": "LLM client in Emacs", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: What Are You Working On? (March 2026)"}]}], "caveats": [{"label": "Not agentic", "summary": "One user found it great for completion-like work but dropped it for agentic tools.", "quotes": [{"id": 804453009, "item_id": 50278313, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50278313", "by": "gpderetta", "date": "2026-10-28", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I have used gptel a while ago which was great for completion-like workflow, but abandoned when I moved to more agentic stuff.", "excerpt": "I'm using claude-code.el. What am I missing? (Aside from integration with other models of course). I have used gptel a while ago which was great for completion-like workflow, but abandoned when I moved to more agentic stuff.", "context": "Emacs user", "use_case": "completion-like LLM workflow", "switched_from": "", "story": "Emacs Turns 50"}]}], "who": [{"by": "gpderetta", "context": "Emacs user", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50278313", "date": "2026-10-28"}, {"by": "rpdillon", "context": "Emacs user since '97", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48590671", "date": "2026-06-18"}, {"by": "iLemming", "context": "Emacs user", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47939278", "date": "2026-04-28"}, {"by": "minikomi", "context": "Emacs user", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47939206", "date": "2026-04-28"}, {"by": "spudlyo", "context": "retired for two years", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47390424", "date": "2026-03-15"}, {"by": "stephen_cagle", "context": "Linux user", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47186611", "date": "2026-02-27"}, {"by": "ryanobjc", "context": "Emacs user", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46817202", "date": "2026-01-29"}], "tags": ["for Emacs users", "for Org mode users", "for note-taking", "for language learning"], "use_cases": ["llm client in emacs", "llm in emacs", "completion-like llm workflow", "llm chat inside emacs", "quick llm requests from anywhere in emacs", "llm interaction in emacs"], "compared": [{"slug": "emacs", "name": "Emacs", "co": 5, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 0}, {"slug": "yt-dlp", "name": "yt-dlp", "co": 2, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 0}, {"slug": "gemini", "name": "Gemini", "co": 2, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 0}, {"slug": "anki-editor", "name": "anki-editor", "co": 2, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 0}, {"slug": "claude-code", "name": "Claude Code", "co": 2, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 0}], "makers": [], "threads": [{"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47906651", "title": "I have officially retired from Emacs", "mentions": 2}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50273171", "title": "Emacs Turns 50", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49503601", "title": "\u201cI just chose words carefully\u201d", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48542784", "title": "Emacs, how it all started (for me)", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48237663", "title": "DeepSeek makes the V4 Pro price discount permanent", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47741527", "title": "Ask HN: What Are You Working On? (April 2026)", "mentions": 1}], "sentiment_by_month": {"2025-11": {}, "2025-12": {"recommend": 1}, "2026-01": {"recommend": 1}, "2026-02": {"recommend": 2}, "2026-03": {"recommend": 1}, "2026-04": {"neutral": 1, "recommend": 2}, "2026-05": {"neutral": 1}, "2026-06": {"neutral": 1}, "2026-07": {}, "2026-08": {"recommend": 1}, "2026-09": {}, "2026-10": {"neutral": 1}}, "quotes": [{"id": 804453009, "item_id": 50278313, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50278313", "by": "gpderetta", "date": "2026-10-28", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I have used gptel a while ago which was great for completion-like workflow, but abandoned when I moved to more agentic stuff.", "excerpt": "I'm using claude-code.el. What am I missing? (Aside from integration with other models of course). I have used gptel a while ago which was great for completion-like workflow, but abandoned when I moved to more agentic stuff.", "context": "Emacs user", "use_case": "completion-like LLM workflow", "switched_from": "", "story": "Emacs Turns 50"}, {"id": 792081713, "item_id": 49505107, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49505107", "by": "iLemming", "date": "2026-08-31", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I invoked (gptel-inline) - if the answer is short - I'd dismiss the popup", "excerpt": "Almost irrelevant to the story itself, but here's what it feels like to use Emacs these days. The story talks about monospace fonts and how unappealing they could be for reading prose. It is a fascinating post on itself, but here's what happened - it caught my eye while I was busy, I clicked the link, it opened the page, I kept it hanging around and forgot about it. Then HN page got buried in my browser history. Afte", "context": "", "use_case": "LLM chat inside Emacs", "switched_from": "", "story": "\u201cI just chose words carefully\u201d"}, {"id": 777450738, "item_id": 48590671, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48590671", "by": "rpdillon", "date": "2026-06-18", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "configuration for gptel, agent-shell, and various hydras", "excerpt": "Emacs guy since '97, strongly agree. If you build your own config, the Ikea effect takes hold and you feel like you've made something that's \"yours\", even if it's mostly cutting and pasting (or using AI) to cobble things together. I think bedrock is reasonable, and so is Prelude (https://github.com/bbatsov/prelude). I used to have a sprawling init.el, but these days is pretty compact (236 lines), mostly using straigh", "context": "Emacs user since '97", "use_case": "LLM in Emacs", "switched_from": "", "story": "Emacs, how it all started (for me)"}, {"id": 771887682, "item_id": 48242980, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48242980", "by": "spudlyo", "date": "2026-05-22", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I use it with Pi and with Gptel", "excerpt": "I use it with Pi and with Gptel and I'm extremely happy about the price. The speed of deepseek-v4-pro though leaves something to be desired. I do love how detailed its chain of thought reasoning is, and it's pretty wild watching it think at ~2400 baud. It much more transparent than Gemini 3.5 flash in that regard, but maybe 4-5x slower? For my Latin language morphology and linguistic tasks it seems to be up to the jo", "context": "", "use_case": "LLM client in Emacs", "switched_from": "", "story": "DeepSeek makes the V4 Pro price discount permanent"}, {"id": 767028448, "item_id": 47939278, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47939278", "by": "iLemming", "date": "2026-04-28", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I like gptel because it's enormously extendable and exploitable", "excerpt": "Of course. I've tried different AI packages and currently gptel and ECA remain the main ingredients. This is a quickly changing landscape, and things may change, but for now it feels very good. I like gptel because it's enormously extendable and exploitable - it allows me to send LLM requests from just about anywhere - I could be typing a message (like this very one) and suddenly in need of ideas for how to phrase so", "context": "Emacs user", "use_case": "quick LLM requests from anywhere in Emacs", "switched_from": "", "story": "I have officially retired from Emacs"}, {"id": 767027296, "item_id": 47939206, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47939206", "by": "minikomi", "date": "2026-04-28", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I use gptel and org mode when I was to be really hands on driving the development.", "excerpt": "Asolutely. It doesn't have to be an either-or. I use gptel and org mode when I was to be really hands on driving the development. It's a very different mode of interacting with models, and the way newer models are trained to play nice with harnesses makes them very obedient. https://poyo.co/note/20260202T150723/", "context": "Emacs user", "use_case": "LLM interaction in Emacs", "switched_from": "", "story": "I have officially retired from Emacs"}, {"id": 763897249, "item_id": 47743578, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47743578", "by": "spudlyo", "date": "2026-04-12", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "along with gptel, Gemini, some local models, yt-dlp, and patreon-dl", "excerpt": "I'm writing an essay about how I use an ancient text editor, GNU Emacs, along with gptel, Gemini, some local models, yt-dlp, and patreon-dl to help me me study an ancient language, Latin. I want to show how I liberate poorly aligned, pixelated PDF image scans of century-old Latin textbooks from the Internet Archive and transform them into glorious Org mode documents while preserving important typographic details, nic", "context": "", "use_case": "LLM in Emacs", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: What Are You Working On? (April 2026)"}, {"id": 758246785, "item_id": 47390424, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47390424", "by": "spudlyo", "date": "2026-03-15", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I use an ancient text editor, GNU Emacs, along with gptel and some other tools to help me me study an ancient language.", "excerpt": "I've been retired for the last two years, it's been transformative. I've lost a lot of weight, I've greatly improved my cardiovascular fitness, I've finally treated my ADHD, I've learned Latin to an intermediate level, I've made new friends, I've gotten into 19th century literature, and as a life-long autodidact I have never been happier. Ultimately, I want to give something back to the world in the next 10 years. I'", "context": "retired for two years", "use_case": "AI language study in Emacs", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: What will you be doing for the next 10 years?"}, {"id": 756858929, "item_id": 47303683, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47303683", "by": "spudlyo", "date": "2026-03-08", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "gptel (a simple LLM client for Emacs)", "excerpt": "I'm writing an essay where I get into how I use GNU Emacs along with gptel (a simple LLM client for Emacs) and Google's Gemini-3 family of models to turn a 1970s-vintage text editor into a futuristic language-learning platform to help me study Latin. I want to show how I liberate poorly aligned, pixelated PDF image scans of century-old Latin textbooks from the Internet Archive and transform them into glorious Org mod", "context": "", "use_case": "LLM client in Emacs", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: What Are You Working On? (March 2026)"}, {"id": 754985777, "item_id": 47186611, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47186611", "by": "stephen_cagle", "date": "2026-02-27", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I do use https://github.com/karthink/gptel on my own machine, because it is just too damn useful.", "excerpt": "I use KVM/QEMU on Linux. I have a set of scripts that I use to create a new directory with a VM project and that also installs a debian image for the VM. I have an ./pull_from_vm and ./push_to_vm that I use to pull and push the git code to and from the vm. As well as a ./claude to start claude on the vm and a ./emacs to initialize and start emacs on the vm after syncing my local .spacemacs directory to the vm (I like", "context": "Linux user", "use_case": "LLM client in Emacs", "switched_from": "", "story": "Let's Discuss Sandbox Isolation"}, {"id": 750400048, "item_id": 46900003, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46900003", "by": "vkazanov", "date": "2026-02-05", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I did consult my LLMs advisor through gptel(https://github.com/karthink/gptel) with a few custom tools setup, which I cannot recommend enough.", "excerpt": "Actually, this is a copy of the older version of interface with a few lines dropped. I failed to generate a decent gif last night, will add a screenshot. Admittedly, while working on this, I did consult my LLMs advisor through gptel(https://github.com/karthink/gptel) with a few custom tools setup, which I cannot recommend enough.", "context": "", "use_case": "LLM client in Emacs", "switched_from": "", "story": "Show HN: Micropolis/SimCity Clone in Emacs Lisp"}, {"id": 749075232, "item_id": 46817202, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46817202", "by": "ryanobjc", "date": "2026-01-29", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I have since turned my LLM usage to gptel inside org-mode buffers.", "excerpt": "I've used chatgpt-shell, but I have since turned my LLM usage to gptel inside org-mode buffers. Every day I use org-roam-dailies-goto-today to make a new file and turn on gptel (the use of org-roam-dailies is 100% optional). Then I do my interactions with gptel in here, using top level bullets and setting topics to limit context. I have 10 months of chats, and now I can analyze them. I even had claude code write me u", "context": "Emacs user", "use_case": "LLM chats in Emacs", "switched_from": "chatgpt-shell", "story": "Agent-shell: A native Emacs buffer to interact with LLM agents powered by ACP"}, {"id": 742898688, "item_id": 46431168, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46431168", "by": "minikomi", "date": "2025-12-30", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "It's been good enough as a memory for me.", "excerpt": "I use gptel[0] with my denote[1] notes, and a tool that can search/retrieve tags/grep/create notes (in a specific sub folder). It's been good enough as a memory for me. 0: https://github.com/karthink/gptel 1: https://protesilaos.com/emacs/denote", "context": "", "use_case": "LLM memory with notes", "switched_from": "", "story": "Stop Claude Code from forgetting everything"}]}