{"slug": "lyx", "name": "LyX", "category": "editors", "category_name": "Editors and IDEs", "description": "", "recommenders": 5, "commenters": 7, "warners": 1, "score": 3.891, "rising": -0.31, "first": "2026-03-06", "latest": "2026-08-11", "why": "LyX (https://www.lyx.org/) for LaTeX is the closest to what I'm thinking of", "why_is_quote": true, "has_verdict": false, "sentiment": {"recommend": 5, "neutral": 1, "compare": 1, "warn": 1}, "spark": [0, 0, 0, 0, 1, 0, 2, 1, 0, 1, 0, 0], "listed": true, "loved": [], "caveat": "", "short_quote": "LyX (https://www.lyx.org/) for LaTeX is the closest to what I'm thinking of", "kind": "", "icon": true, "domain": "lyx.org", "github_repo": null, "official_url": "https://www.lyx.org", "pricing": "", "aliases": ["LyX"], "verdict": null, "praise": [{"label": "", "summary": "", "quotes": [{"id": 788203297, "item_id": 49262706, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49262706", "by": "pbowyer", "date": "2026-08-11", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "LyX (https://www.lyx.org/) for LaTeX is the closest to what I'm thinking of", "excerpt": "All of this, but underlying it I've come to the conclusion that Markdown isn't a good format for a writing environment beyond just simple prose. There's too much left up to the flavour of it and it's got weaknesses. I've been experimenting with using Markdown (in Typora) in place of Word, but it (and others I've looked at) have zero support for image positioning or sizing, or a way to have different (pre-defined) sty", "context": "", "use_case": "structured LaTeX document editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "Show HN: Write.md, a free, open-source, themeable Markdown editor for macOS"}, {"id": 778368848, "item_id": 48648053, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48648053", "by": "ixsploit", "date": "2026-06-23", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I used lyx during university. Was super happy.", "excerpt": "I used lyx during university. Was super happy. Still have all my homework and lecuture notes. https://www.lyx.org/", "context": "used during university", "use_case": "homework and lecture notes", "switched_from": "", "story": "Show HN: TikZ Editor \u2013 WYSIWYG editor for figures in LaTeX"}, {"id": 768862624, "item_id": 48053914, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48053914", "by": "contingencies", "date": "2026-05-07", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "just use LyX + XeTeX + decent fonts", "excerpt": "Meh. For cross-platform, low hassle, just use LyX + XeTeX + decent fonts. Once you learn how to do the commonly annoying things (alignment; indices; pages without footers; custom footers; etc. - AI is good), you can achieve all of them. You will positively loathe using conventional word processing after a short while. https://www.lyx.org/", "context": "", "use_case": "LaTeX document authoring", "switched_from": "", "story": "RaTeX: KaTeX-compatible LaTeX rendering engine in pure Rust"}, {"id": 756363792, "item_id": 47272737, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47272737", "by": "nxobject", "date": "2026-03-06", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "LyX has met my needs since 2019", "excerpt": "I mean, LyX has met my needs since 2019 - I don't particularly need to be optimistic about it. I was even able to bring in parts of my old LaTeX preamble with me, especially some utility macros. It was a pretty painless switch with immediate benefit. (I've done everything in it from write honors theses and format CVs.) I've been interested in Typst. But beyond report generation (which I avoid in general), I don't rea", "context": "", "use_case": "Thesis and CV typesetting", "switched_from": "LaTeX", "story": "TeX Live 2026 is available for download now"}]}], "caveats": [{"label": "", "summary": "", "quotes": [{"id": 767309570, "item_id": 47956848, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47956848", "by": "WillAdams", "date": "2026-04-29", "stance": "warn", "quote": "it really feels like something which LyX should have done", "excerpt": "Well, LaTeX3 was sort of what you describe, but has been dropped: https://www.latex-project.org/latex3/ If nothing else, the support for Unicode via UTF-8 has been a big win, and the new programming model and Lua allow some pretty cool stuff, if I do say so myself --- I'm still impressed by Alan Xiang's solution here: https://tex.stackexchange.com/questions/722886/how-to-write-out-multiple-text-files-from-multiple-in", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "The Lingua Franca of LaTeX"}]}], "who": [{"by": "ixsploit", "context": "used during university", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48648053", "date": "2026-06-23"}], "tags": [], "use_cases": ["structured latex document editing", "homework and lecture notes", "latex document authoring", "document writing", "thesis and cv typesetting"], "compared": [{"slug": "latex", "name": "LaTeX", "co": 2, "switched_from": 1, "switched_to": 0}, {"slug": "xetex", "name": "XeTeX", "co": 2, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 0}], "makers": [], "threads": [{"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48010729", "title": "RaTeX: KaTeX-compatible LaTeX rendering engine in pure Rust", "mentions": 2}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49258011", "title": "Show HN: Write.md, a free, open-source, themeable Markdown editor for macOS", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48645437", "title": "Show HN: TikZ Editor \u2013 WYSIWYG editor for figures in LaTeX", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47934880", "title": "The Lingua Franca of LaTeX", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47652324", "title": "LibreOffice \u2013 Let's put an end to the speculation", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47390945", "title": "The 49MB Web Page", "mentions": 1}], "sentiment_by_month": {"2025-11": {}, "2025-12": {}, "2026-01": {}, "2026-02": {}, "2026-03": {"recommend": 1, "neutral": 1}, "2026-04": {"compare": 1, "warn": 1}, "2026-05": {"recommend": 2}, "2026-06": {"recommend": 1}, "2026-07": {}, "2026-08": {"recommend": 1}, "2026-09": {}, "2026-10": {}}, "quotes": [{"id": 788203297, "item_id": 49262706, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49262706", "by": "pbowyer", "date": "2026-08-11", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "LyX (https://www.lyx.org/) for LaTeX is the closest to what I'm thinking of", "excerpt": "All of this, but underlying it I've come to the conclusion that Markdown isn't a good format for a writing environment beyond just simple prose. There's too much left up to the flavour of it and it's got weaknesses. I've been experimenting with using Markdown (in Typora) in place of Word, but it (and others I've looked at) have zero support for image positioning or sizing, or a way to have different (pre-defined) sty", "context": "", "use_case": "structured LaTeX document editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "Show HN: Write.md, a free, open-source, themeable Markdown editor for macOS"}, {"id": 778368848, "item_id": 48648053, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48648053", "by": "ixsploit", "date": "2026-06-23", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I used lyx during university. Was super happy.", "excerpt": "I used lyx during university. Was super happy. Still have all my homework and lecuture notes. https://www.lyx.org/", "context": "used during university", "use_case": "homework and lecture notes", "switched_from": "", "story": "Show HN: TikZ Editor \u2013 WYSIWYG editor for figures in LaTeX"}, {"id": 769472688, "item_id": 48092043, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48092043", "by": "a96", "date": "2026-05-11", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "", "excerpt": "Oh, wow, there's a new LyX release! It's been almost 30 years since I used it and it's still going.", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "RaTeX: KaTeX-compatible LaTeX rendering engine in pure Rust"}, {"id": 768862624, "item_id": 48053914, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48053914", "by": "contingencies", "date": "2026-05-07", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "just use LyX + XeTeX + decent fonts", "excerpt": "Meh. For cross-platform, low hassle, just use LyX + XeTeX + decent fonts. Once you learn how to do the commonly annoying things (alignment; indices; pages without footers; custom footers; etc. - AI is good), you can achieve all of them. You will positively loathe using conventional word processing after a short while. https://www.lyx.org/", "context": "", "use_case": "LaTeX document authoring", "switched_from": "", "story": "RaTeX: KaTeX-compatible LaTeX rendering engine in pure Rust"}, {"id": 767309570, "item_id": 47956848, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47956848", "by": "WillAdams", "date": "2026-04-29", "stance": "warn", "quote": "it really feels like something which LyX should have done", "excerpt": "Well, LaTeX3 was sort of what you describe, but has been dropped: https://www.latex-project.org/latex3/ If nothing else, the support for Unicode via UTF-8 has been a big win, and the new programming model and Lua allow some pretty cool stuff, if I do say so myself --- I'm still impressed by Alan Xiang's solution here: https://tex.stackexchange.com/questions/722886/how-to-write-out-multiple-text-files-from-multiple-in", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "The Lingua Franca of LaTeX"}, {"id": 762447457, "item_id": 47652966, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47652966", "by": "contingencies", "date": "2026-04-05", "stance": "compare", "quote": "writer < LyX", "excerpt": "I use and promote Libreoffice instead of cloud SaaS and M$ religiously and have been doing so for decades. While it does feel that 'peak office suite' is solidly in the rear-view mirror and the majority of tools are becoming ~irrelevant (nobody does physical meetings anymore, writer < LyX and spreadsheets are being supplanted by custom code with better visualization control and web integration), I still need Writer t", "context": "", "use_case": "document writing", "switched_from": "", "story": "LibreOffice \u2013 Let's put an end to the speculation"}, {"id": 758285664, "item_id": 47392854, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47392854", "by": "anthk", "date": "2026-03-15", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I used the text web (https://text.npr.org and the like) thru Lyx.", "excerpt": "I used the text web (https://text.npr.org and the like) thru Lyx. Also, Usenet, Gopher, Gemini, some 16 KBPS opus streams, everything under 2.7 KBPS when my phone data plan was throttled and I was using it in tethering mode. Tons of sites did work, but Gopher://magical.fish ran really fast. Bitlbee saved (and still saves) my ass with tons of the protocols available via IRC using nearly nil data to connect. Also you c", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "The 49MB Web Page"}, {"id": 756363792, "item_id": 47272737, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47272737", "by": "nxobject", "date": "2026-03-06", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "LyX has met my needs since 2019", "excerpt": "I mean, LyX has met my needs since 2019 - I don't particularly need to be optimistic about it. I was even able to bring in parts of my old LaTeX preamble with me, especially some utility macros. It was a pretty painless switch with immediate benefit. (I've done everything in it from write honors theses and format CVs.) I've been interested in Typst. But beyond report generation (which I avoid in general), I don't rea", "context": "", "use_case": "Thesis and CV typesetting", "switched_from": "LaTeX", "story": "TeX Live 2026 is available for download now"}]}