Bash
GNU's Unix shell and command language, the default shell on most Linux distributions.
Liked as a dependable everyday shell1234 that is already installed on nearly every machine and handles small glue scripts well.5678 The most common complaint is that its scripting language is full of footguns and unintuitive behavior,9101112 pushing some users toward fish, zsh, Nushell or Python for anything beyond simple tasks.131415
Why people recommend it
Daily driver · 3
Commenters use it every day as their primary shell and find it useful and simple.
“I use tmux every day, vim and bash and stuff, all great, genuinely like them”
“Despite bash being a terrible language, I still use it on a daily basis because it is useful.”
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Available everywhere · 3
It is the default on Linux and present on new VMs and random computers, so skills carry over anywhere.
“I spin up a new VM somewhere and it's going to have bash.”
“And use the default shell. Zsh on Mac bash on every Linux I’ve ever used”
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“I use ctrl+R for search that way I'm not dependent of a terminal emulator features and can get to work even on random computers.”
Glue scripting · 3
Paired with sed, awk, jq and curl, it handles small scripts without the packaging overhead of Python.
“For small stuff I use bash / sed / awk / jq / yq / curl etc.”
“we could simply use bash and KDE konsole with, say, 10 tabs. That setup works for me since ages”
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“Give me a bash shell, g++, perl, the shell tools, and a web browser, and I'm good.”
Customizable · 2
Long-lived dotfiles, oh my bash and atuin let users tailor prompts, history search and functions.
“I never moved to omz (or even zsh; I still rock bash) because I have 10+ years of dotfiles that cover all of my needs.”
“Ghostty with bash”
Reliability · 1
One commenter says it has never crashed for them in decades of use.
“the ones written in C are the most reliable (such as vim, bash, coreutils, terminals, X11¹, ... also larger software such as gimp, blender)”
Thorough manual · 1
The Bash manual is recommended as answering nearly every question and exposing hidden gotchas.
“I highly recommend reading the entire BASH manual”
Caveats and dissent
Language footguns · 3
Implicit word splitting, IFS handling and other non-intuitive behavior make correct scripts hard to write.
“I try to encourage people to use better designed shells that have less of these footguns”
“Despite bash being a terrible language, I still use it on a daily basis because it is useful.”
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“This is bash 5.3.9-1.”
Cross-platform scripts · 1
Differences between bash, zsh and msys2 led one commenter to switch to Python for scripts on Windows, Mac and Linux.
“Switched from bash to plain python scripts for shell stuff everywhere several years ago, and never looked back into bash zoo anymore.”
Real scripting elsewhere · 2
Some users keep bash as an interactive shell but write real logic in Ruby or Python.
“we could simply use bash and KDE konsole with, say, 10 tabs. That setup works for me since ages”
History expansion · 1
History expansion can run destructive commands unseen, though `shopt -s histverify` lets you review them first.
“You can also set `shopt -s histverify` to expand the history substitution on the following line”
Often compared with
Who recommends it in their own words
Threads where it came up
- Ask HN: What shell/terminal setup would you recommend to beginners today? 3 mentions
- Ask HN: What's the oldest software tool you still rely on every day? 2 mentions
- A shell exclamation mark is not for yelling. Be lazy 2 mentions
- A shell colon does nothing. Use it anyway. 2 mentions
- You probably don't need Oh My Zsh 2 mentions
- Show HN: OmniPTY – Opinionated terminal emulator for macOS and Linux 1 mention
Also written as bash. Data: bash.json. Quotes are verbatim; the verdict and theme labels are written by a model from these comments, and every clause links to its sources.
All comments 23
“I use tmux every day, vim and bash and stuff, all great, genuinely like them”
“the ones written in C are the most reliable (such as vim, bash, coreutils, terminals, X11¹, ... also larger software such as gimp, blender)”
“Not sure exactly, but probably either Emacs or Bash.”
“Because it holds up the universe on its shoulders.”
“I try to encourage people to use better designed shells that have less of these footguns”
“You can also set `shopt -s histverify` to expand the history substitution on the following line”
“Emacs shenanigans are why I use Bash.”
“Despite bash being a terrible language, I still use it on a daily basis because it is useful.”
“Switched from bash to plain python scripts for shell stuff everywhere several years ago, and never looked back into bash zoo anymore.”
“all you need is `bash --posix` to prove it”
“For small stuff I use bash / sed / awk / jq / yq / curl etc.”
“This is bash 5.3.9-1.”
“bash for shell.”
“And use the default shell. Zsh on Mac bash on every Linux I’ve ever used”
“Ghostty with bash”
“I highly recommend reading the entire BASH manual”
“we could simply use bash and KDE konsole with, say, 10 tabs. That setup works for me since ages”
“I never moved to omz (or even zsh; I still rock bash) because I have 10+ years of dotfiles that cover all of my needs.”
“I spin up a new VM somewhere and it's going to have bash.”
“I do use bash as my primary shell”
“I know how to use systemd and I know how to use bash”
“Give me a bash shell, g++, perl, the shell tools, and a web browser, and I'm good.”
“I use ctrl+R for search that way I'm not dependent of a terminal emulator features and can get to work even on random computers.”