View source for Comparison of hex editors

{{short description|None}}

{{More citations needed|date=July 2007}}
The following is a comparison of notable [[hex editor]]s.
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== General ==
{| border="1" cellpadding="1" cellspacing="0" style="font-size: 85%; border: gray solid 1px; border-collapse: collapse; text-align: center; width: 100%;" class="sortable wikitable"
|-style="background: #ececec;"
! style="width:12em" |
! [[GUI]]
! [[Command-line interface|Console]]
! [[Software license]]
! data-sort-type="number"|Latest stable version
! Latest release date
! Windows
! Macintosh
! Linux
|-
! {{rh}} | [[HxD]]
| {{Yes}}
| {{No}}
| {{Proprietary|Proprietary freeware}}
| 2.5.0.0
| {{Dts|2021|February|11}}
| style="background:#9F9" data-sort-value="Yes"|[[Windows 95|Win95]], [[Windows NT 4.0|WinNT4]] and up
| {{no}}
| {{no}}
|-
! {{rh}} | [[010 Editor]]
| {{Yes}}
| {{No}}
| {{Proprietary}}
| 15.0.2
| {{Dts|2025|March|31}}
| {{yes}}
| {{yes}}
| {{yes}}
|-
! {{rh}} | [[beye]]
| {{No}}
| {{Yes}}
| {{open source|[[GNU General Public License|GPL-2.0-only]] or [[GNU General Public License|GPL-3.0-only]]}}
| 6.1.0
| {{Dts|2009|December|12}}
| {{yes}}
| {{yes}}
| {{yes}}
|-
! {{rh}} | [[bvi]]
| {{No}}
| {{Yes}}
| {{open source|[[GNU General Public License|GPL-3.0-or-later]]}}
| 1.4.2<ref>{{cite web | url=https://bvi.sourceforge.net/download.html | title=BVI Binary VIsual editor: Download Page }}</ref>
| {{Dts|2023|March|7}}
| style="background:#9f9" data-sort-value="Yes"|[[DOS]], [[Windows 95|Win95]] and up
| {{yes}}
| {{yes}}
|-
! {{rh}} | [[Cheat Engine]]
| {{Yes}}
| {{No}}
| {{Proprietary|Proprietary freeware}}
| 7.2
| {{Dts|2021|08|14}}
| {{yes}}
| {{Yes}}, ver. 6.2
| {{no}}
|-
! {{rh}} | [[GNU Emacs]]
| {{Yes}}
| {{Yes}}
| {{open source|[[GNU General Public License|GPL-3.0-or-later]]}}
| 29.1<ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.gnu.org/software/emacs/ |title=GNU Emacs |last1= |first1= |last2= |first2= |date= |website=[[GNU|GNU.org]] |publisher= |access-date=2023-08-09|quote=}}</ref>
| {{Dts|2023|7|30}}
| {{yes}}
| {{yes}}
| {{yes}}
|-
! {{rh}} | [[FlexHex]]
| {{Yes}}
| {{No}}
| {{Proprietary|Proprietary freeware for personal use}}
| 2.7
| {{Dts|2018|October|12}}
| style="background:#9F9" data-sort-value="Yes"|[[Windows XP]] and up
| {{no}}
| {{no}}
|-
! {{rh}} | [[Frhed]] (Free Hex Editor)
| {{Yes}}
| {{No}}
| {{open source|[[GNU General Public License|GPL-2.0-or-later]]}}
| 1.7.1
| {{Dts|2009|July|30}}
| style="background:#9F9" data-sort-value="Yes"|[[Windows 98|Win98]] and up
| {{no}}
| {{no}}
|-
! {{rh}} | [[Hexer (editor)|Hexer]]
| {{No}}
| {{Yes}}
| {{open source|[[BSD license|BSD-3-Clause]]}}
| 1.06
| {{Dts|2020|April|24}}
| {{yes}}
| {{yes}}
| {{yes}}
|-
! {{rh}} | [[Hiew]]
| {{No}}
| {{Yes}}
| {{Proprietary}}
| 8.81
| {{Dts|2024|March|24}}
| {{yes}}
| {{no}}
| {{no}}
|-
! {{rh}} | [[ImHex]]
| {{Yes}}
| {{Yes}}
| {{open source|[[GNU General Public License|GPL-2.0-only]]}}
| 1.35.4
| {{Dts|2024|July|9}}<ref>{{cite web | url=https://github.com/WerWolv/ImHex/releases | title=Releases · WerWolv/ImHex | website=[[GitHub]] }}</ref>
| {{yes}}
| {{yes}}
| {{yes}}
|-
! {{rh}} | [[VEDIT]]
| {{Yes}}
| {{Yes}}
| {{Proprietary}}
| 6.24.2
| {{Dts|2015|Jan|1}}
| {{yes}}
| {{no}}
| {{no}}
|-
! {{rh}} | [[UltraEdit]]
| {{Yes}}
| {{No}}
| {{Proprietary}}
| 26.10 (Windows) <br /> 18.0 (Linux / Mac OS X) 
| {{Dts|2019|05|07}} <br /> {{Dts|2018|01|02}}
| {{yes}}
| {{yes}}
| {{yes}}
|-
! {{rh}} | [[WinHex]]
| {{Yes}}
| {{No}}
| {{Proprietary}}
| 21.0
| {{Dts|2023|12|13}}
| style="background:#9F9" data-sort-value="Yes"|[[Windows 95|Win95]] and up
| {{no}}
| {{no}}
|-
! {{rh}} | [[Vim (text editor)|Vim]]
| {{Yes}}
| {{Yes}}
| {{open source|Vim}}
| 9.1.0<ref>{{cite web | url=https://www.vim.org/vim-9.1-released.php | title=Vim 9.1 released : Vim online }}</ref>
| {{Dts|2024|1|2}}
| {{Yes}}
| {{Yes}}
| {{Yes}}
|}

== Features ==
{{sort-under}}
{| class="wikitable sortable sort-under" style="font-size: 85%; border: gray solid 1px; border-collapse: collapse; text-align: center; width: 100%;"
|- style="background: #ececec;"
! 
! Maximum file size
! Partial file loading
! Disk sector editing
! Process memory editing
! Data inspector
! [[Bitwise operation|Bit editing]]
! Insert<br/>/<br/>delete<br/>bytes
! [[Character encodings]]<sup>([[#fn ao|ao]])</sup>
! Search [[Unicode]]
! [[File format]]s <!-- support for parsing arbitrary file/data formats, provide number of publicly available parsers -->
! [[Disassembler]]
! File compare
! Find in files
! Bookmarks
! Macro
! [[Text editor]]
|-
! {{rh}} | [[HxD]]
| 8 [[EiB]]<ref name="hxd_features">[http://mh-nexus.de/en/hxd/ HxD features]</ref>
| {{yes}}
| {{yes|Windows 9x/NT and up}}
| {{yes}}
| {{yes}}
| {{yes}}
| {{yes}}
| ANSI, ASCII, OEM, [[EBCDIC]], Macintosh
| {{yes}}
| {{no}}
| {{partial|Individual instructions only}}
| {{yes}}
| {{no}}
| {{yes}}
| {{no}}
| {{no}}
|-
! {{rh}} | [[010 Editor]]
| 8 [[EiB]]
| {{yes}}
| {{yes}}
| {{partial|WinNT only}}
| {{yes}}
| {{yes}}
| {{yes}}
| ANSI, OEM, [[Unicode]], [[UTF-8]], [[EBCDIC]], Custom
| {{yes}}
| {{yes|300}} <ref>{{cite web|title=010 Editor - Binary Template Repository|publisher=SweetScape Software Inc.|url=https://www.sweetscape.com/010editor/repository/templates/|access-date=2022-10-05}}</ref>
| {{yes}}
| {{yes}}
| {{yes}}
| {{yes}}
| {{yes}}
| {{yes}}
|-
! {{rh}} | [[beye]]
| 8&nbsp;[[pebibyte|PiB]]
| {{yes}}
| {{no}}
|
|
| {{yes}}
| {{yes}}
| ANSI, [[EBCDIC]], [[ASCII]], Macintosh
| {{yes}}
| {{yes|29}} <ref>{{cite web|title=beye / Code / [r238] /newtwindow-branch/src/plugins/bin/|website=[[SourceForge]]|url=https://sourceforge.net/p/beye/code/HEAD/tree/newtwindow-branch/src/plugins/bin/|access-date=2022-10-05}}</ref>
| data-sort-value="Yes" {{yes|[[Atmel AVR|AVR]], [[Java Virtual Machine|Java]], [[x86]], [[i386]], [[x86-64]], [[ARM architecture|ARM]]/[[XScale]], [[PowerPC]], [[PPC64]]}}
|
|
| {{yes}}
| {{no}}
|-
! {{rh}} | [[bvi]]
| Limited by RAM
| {{yes}}
|
|
|
| {{yes}}
| {{yes}}
| ANSI, [[ASCII]]
|
| {{no}}
| {{no}}
|
| {{Yes}} and replace
|
| {{yes}}
|-
! {{rh}} | [[Emacs]]
| Limited by RAM<ref>{{cite web |title=GNU Emacs 23.2 NEWS -- history of user-visible changes. |url=https://www.gnu.org/software/emacs/NEWS.23.2}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.gnu.org/software/emacs/manual/html_node/emacs/Buffers.html|title=Buffers|quote=A buffer's size cannot be larger than some maximum, which is defined by the largest buffer position representable by Emacs integers. This is because Emacs tracks buffer positions using that data type. For typical 64-bit machines, this maximum buffer size is 2^{61} - 2 bytes, or about 2 EiB. For typical 32-bit machines, the maximum is usually 2^{29} - 2 bytes, or about 512 MiB. Buffer sizes are also limited by the amount of memory in the system.}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |title=Does Emacs have problems with large files? |url=https://www.gnu.org/software/emacs/manual/html_node/efaq/Problems-with-very-large-files.html}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |title=GNU emacs manual - Narrowing |url=https://www.gnu.org/software/emacs/manual/html_node/emacs/Narrowing.html}}</ref>
| {{no}}
| {{unknown}}
| {{no}}
| {{no}}
| {{no}}
| {{no}}
| {{yes}}
| {{yes}}<ref>{{cite web |title=Special Input for Incremental Search |url=https://www.gnu.org/software/emacs/manual/html_node/emacs/Special-Isearch.html |website=gnu.org}}</ref>
| {{unknown}}
| {{no}}
| {{no}}
| {{unknown}}
| {{unknown}}
| {{yes}}<ref>{{cite web |title=Bookmarks |url=https://www.gnu.org/software/emacs/manual/html_node/emacs/Bookmarks.html |website=gnu.org}}</ref>
| {{yes}}
|-
! {{rh}} | [[FlexHex]]
| Unlimited{{citation needed|date=October 2019}}
| {{yes}}
| {{yes}}
|
| {{yes}}
| {{yes}}
| {{yes}}
| ANSI, OEM, UTF-16
| {{yes}}
| {{yes|2}} <ref>{{cite web|title=User-defined Data Fields|publisher=Inv Softworks LLC|url=http://www.flexhex.com/product/tour/data_fields.phtml|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20051227170026/http://www.flexhex.com/product/tour/data_fields.phtml|url-status=usurped|archive-date=December 27, 2005|access-date=2022-10-05}}</ref><ref>The file "FlexHEX\Structures\Disk.fsd" of FlexHex 2.71 installation contains example parsers for FAT and NFTS file system headers</ref>
| {{no}}
| {{yes}}
| {{no}}
| {{yes}}
| 
| {{no}}
|-
! {{rh}} | [[Frhed]]
| Limited by RAM
| {{yes}}
| {{no}}<sup>(read only)</sup>
|
|
| {{yes}}
| {{yes}}
| ANSI, OEM
| {{yes}}
| {{no}}
| {{no}}
| {{yes}}
| {{no}}
| {{yes}}
| {{no}}
|-
! {{rh}} | [[Hiew]]
| Unlimited{{citation needed|date=October 2019}}
| {{yes}}
| {{partial|WinNT only}}
|
| {{yes}}
| {{yes}}
| {{yes}}
| [[ASCII]], OEM, [[Unicode]], custom
| {{yes}}
| {{no}}
| data-sort-value="Yes" {{yes|[[x86]], [[x86-64]], [[MMX (instruction set)|MMX]], SSE 4.2, [[3DNow!]] - all assembler, [[ARM architecture|ARM]]}}
|
| {{yes}}
| {{yes}}
| {{yes}}
|-
! {{rh}} | [[VEDIT]]
| Standard, 2&nbsp;GiB, Pro 64, unlimited{{citation needed|date=October 2019}}
| {{yes}}
| data-sort-value="Partial" {{partial|DOS version only}}
|
| {{no}}
| {{yes}}
| {{yes}}
| ANSI, OEM, [[EBCDIC]], [[ASCII]], custom
| {{no}}
| {{no}}
| {{no}}
| {{yes}}
| {{yes}}
| {{yes}}
| {{yes}}
| {{yes}}
|-
! {{rh}} | [[UltraEdit]]
| >4&nbsp;GiB
| {{yes}}
| {{no}}
| {{no}}
| {{no}}
| {{no}}
| {{yes}}
| ANSI, OEM, [[EBCDIC]], [[ASCII]], Mac, Unix, UTF-8
| {{yes}}
| {{no}}
| {{no}}
| {{yes}}
| {{yes}}
| {{yes}}
|-
! {{rh}} | [[WinHex]]
| Unlimited{{citation needed|date=October 2019}}
| {{yes}}
| {{yes}}
|
| {{yes}}
| {{yes}}
| {{yes}}
| {{partial}} support of these formats: ANSI, UNICODE, OEM, [[UTF-8]]/[[UTF-16]], [[EBCDIC]], [[ASCII]]
| {{yes}}
| {{yes|44}} <ref>{{cite web|title=Additional Templates for WinHex & X-Ways Forensics|publisher=X-Ways Software Technology AG|url=https://www.x-ways.net/winhex/templates/index.html|access-date=2022-10-05}} lists ~30 formats.</ref><ref>WinHex 20.6 release package "winhex.zip" contains 14 template files with ".tpl" suffix with parsers for various storage system formats.</ref>
| {{partial|Only x86 Intel opcodes}}
| {{yes}}
| data-sort-value="Yes" {{Yes}} and replace
|
| {{yes}}<ref name="Winhex_macro">[http://www.winhex.com/winhex/scripting.html WinHex: Scripting]</ref>
| {{no}}
|-
! {{rh}} | [[vim (text editor)|vim]]
| Limited by RAM
| {{no}}
| {{no}}
| {{no}}
| {{no}}
| {{yes}}<ref>:help eval</ref>
| {{yes}}
| ASCII, ISO-8859, DOS (OEM), UTF-8, UTF-16, partial EBCDIC (compilation required), unicode
| {{yes}}
| {{no}}
| {{no}}
| {{yes}}<ref>vimdiff</ref>
| {{no}}
| {{yes2|Plug-in}}<ref>[https://github.com/MattesGroeger/vim-bookmarks vim-bookmarks]</ref>
| {{Yes}}
| {{yes}}
|-
! {{rh}} | [[ImHex]]
| Unlimited
| {{yes}}
| {{yes}}
| {{yes}}
| {{yes}}
| {{yes}}
| {{yes}}
| ANSI, OEM, [[Unicode]], [[UTF-8]], [[EBCDIC]], [[Shift-JIS]], Custom
| {{yes}}
| {{yes|143}} <ref>{{cite web|title=ImHex-Patterns|website=[[GitHub]]|url=https://github.com/WerWolv/ImHex-Patterns|access-date=2023-01-29}}</ref>
| {{yes}}
| {{yes}}
| {{yes}}
| {{yes}}
| {{yes}}
| {{no}}
|- class="sortbottom"
!
! Maximum file size
! Partial file loading
! Disk sector editing
! Process memory editing
! Data inspector
! [[Bitwise operation|Bit editing]]
! Insert<br/>/<br/>delete<br/>bytes
! [[Character encodings]]<sup>([[#fn ao|ao]])</sup>
! Search [[Unicode]]
! [[File format]]s
! [[Disassembler]]
! File compare
! Find in files
! Bookmarks
! Macro
! [[Text editor]]
|}

==See also==
*[[Comparison of HTML editors]]
*[[Comparison of integrated development environments]]
*[[Comparison of text editors]]
*[[Comparison of word processors]]

==Notes==
<cite id="fn_ao">ao:</cite> ''[[ANSI]]'' is the Windows character set, ''[[Code page 437|OEM]]'' is the DOS character set. Both are based on [[ASCII]].

==References==
<references/>

== External links ==
*[http://members.tripod.com/HarryMNielsen/ "Harry's Windows Hex Editor Review"] (July 2002). harrymnielsen.tripod.com. Retrieved October 15, 2019.

[[Category:Software comparisons|Hex editors]]
[[Category:Hex editors| ]]
[[Category:Text editor comparisons]]