Zed

// Overview

Zed is a code editor built in Rust by Zed Industries, the team behind Atom and Tree-sitter. It is designed around performance and multiplayer editing: several people can work in the same buffer, and the editor's own rendering and language tooling are written to keep keystroke latency low. It runs on macOS, Linux and Windows, installed either from a direct download at zed.dev or through a package manager; a web version is not available and is tracked in a public discussion.

Alongside the editor, Zed ships an AI agent panel that can read and change files in the project. Since version 1.14 that panel runs inside an operating-system sandbox by default — Seatbelt on macOS, Bubblewrap namespaces on Linux (which need the `bwrap` binary without the setuid bit), and WSL on Windows, where non-WSL shells do not support sandboxing. Inside the sandbox an agent cannot write outside the project directory or make network requests without permission, and it can ask to escalate privileges temporarily, showing the user which privilege it wants and why. Write access to `.git` is never grantable, because git hooks would run outside the sandbox.

The source is public and community contributions are accepted; the code is licensed primarily under GPL-3.0-or-later with Apache-2.0 components where marked, and third-party license compliance is enforced in CI with cargo-about. Zed Industries is a for-profit company and funds the project through its commercial offering and GitHub Sponsors.

// What it does

• A Rust-native editor built for low input latency, from the creators of Atom and Tree-sitter
• Multiplayer editing — several people in the same buffer, with shared project state
• A built-in AI agent panel that edits files in the project directly
• OS-level sandboxing of agents by default: Seatbelt on macOS, Bubblewrap on Linux, WSL on Windows
• Granular, explained privilege escalation — the agent states which permission it needs and why, and can never be granted writes to .git
• Open source under GPL-3.0-or-later, with installers for macOS, Linux and Windows plus package-manager support

// Getting started

Install the editor, open a project, then use the agent panel — sandboxing is on by default from 1.14 onward, so no extra hardening step is required.

https://zed.dev/download

which bwrap

git clone https://github.com/zed-industries/zed.git
cd zed
cargo run

Commands and code are distilled from the project's own documentation — always check the official repo for the latest.

// When to use it

• Edit large codebases in an editor tuned for latency rather than plugin breadth
• Pair or mob program with teammates directly inside the same buffer
• Let an in-editor agent make changes with the operating system, not just the app, enforcing what it can touch
• Contribute to or self-build an open-source editor rather than depending on a closed one

// Zed in the news

1. 2026-08-12MAJORDelta — Zed's multiplayer workspace for coding with agents
2. 2026-08-05MAJORZed 1.14 Sandboxing — OS enforces what agents can touch
3. 2026-04-29MAJORZed 1.0 — AI-Native Editor Hits Stable, Multiple Parallel Agents Built In
4. 2026-04-22NOTABLEZed 0.233.5 — Parallel Agents: Multiple AI Threads in One Editor Window

From the AI/TLDR release feed — every item is source-verified when it ships.

// How Zed compares

Zed alongside other open-source ide copilots tools AI/TLDR tracks, ranked by GitHub stars.