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My 4 Favorite Cloud IDEs for 2021
Glitch, Gitpod, and more
The modern application developer works across many different code bases, each built with a different tech stack and maintained on a different cadence. Setting up and maintaining a single local development environment is plenty of work on its own. Managing multiple development environments on a single computer is even more challenging.
Enter web-based integrated development platforms (“cloud IDEs”). They make it easy to give each project its own isolated development environment, living in a container, managed by someone else.
When I say “cloud IDE,” I mean a development-environment-as-a-service. A fully hosted, fully featured editor environment, with terminal-level access to run commands and access the filesystem, available through a web browser.
I last surveyed the cloud IDE landscape about a year ago, and things have evolved enough that I think the topic is worth revisiting. I’ll begin with a review of my four favorites and then finish with a look at some other interesting takes on the cloud IDE idea.
The Winners’ Circle
Is there one cloud IDE that is better than all the rest? At this time, no. Each tool has its own strengths, and depending on your circumstances, any given cloud IDE may or may not be the best tool for the job. My winners’ circle includes the four cloud IDEs that address most of my needs, most of the time.
The criteria I used to evaluate the cloud IDEs include the usefulness of its free tier, its support for multiple languages, its integration with source control and deployment services, and its support for collaborative editing.
Two of my favorites are frontend, web development (JavaScript)-focused, while the other two are language-agnostic. Two can be used as hosting platforms. Three of them support collaborative editing. All have a free tier.
My favorites, in alphabetical order:
CodeSandbox
This service began life as a frontend code sandbox but has continued to improve over time and is now a fully…
