Is l8git really free, and does it stay that way?

Yes. l8git is MIT-licensed and fully open source, and the roadmap commits to keeping it that way: no paywall, no fair-source model, no proprietary components. Sustainability runs through GitHub Sponsors and Open Collective, not through locked features.

What makes it different from GitHub Desktop, Sourcetree or GitKraken?

Three things. It is built for many repositories at once rather than one at a time. It ships the workflows those clients leave to the terminal — interactive rebase, stacks, reflog, bisect, worktrees, hooks, LFS. And it is the first Git client designed around coding agents, each running in an isolated worktree with hunk-level review before anything merges.

Is it an Electron app?

No. l8git is built on Tauri 2 with a Rust backend and the system webview, so the bundle is a fraction of an Electron app's size and memory use stays low. Git operations run on a blocking thread pool and never freeze the interface.

Which Git hosts are supported?

GitHub and GitHub Enterprise, GitLab (gitlab.com and self-hosted), Bitbucket, and Gitea/Forgejo including gitea.com and Codeberg. Provider capabilities are detected, so the UI only offers actions the host actually supports.

Do I have to use the AI features?

No. Every AI feature is opt-in and needs a key you provide. If you want AI without sending anything off your machine, point l8git at a local Ollama model — it is a first-class, key-free provider. AI never applies a change on its own; conflict resolutions and commit splits are proposals you edit and approve.

Where are my credentials stored?

In your operating system's keychain — Keychain on macOS, Credential Manager on Windows, the Secret Service on Linux. Nothing is written to a plaintext config file, and a security review of the codebase has been completed with its findings fixed.

Can I see exactly what git commands it runs?

Yes, that is a built-in panel. The transparency log records every git invocation with its arguments, duration and exit status. Combined with universal undo and the reflog view, nothing the app does is hidden or irreversible.

Does it work with large monorepos?

The commit history and diff views are virtualised, commit search is debounced and paginated in the Rust backend, and the file watcher skips node_modules, target and build artefacts. Performance on monorepos is tracked as a CI benchmark, not as a hope.

CONTRIBUTING.md covers the setup, the architecture, the i18n rules and the commit conventions, and it lists concrete small tasks that make good first contributions. Issues, discussions and pull requests are all open on GitHub.

v0.5.0 · MIT

Download l8git

Free on every platform, with no account and no licence key. Open a repository and you have the commit graph, the diff and an AI-drafted commit message before you have configured anything.

macOS

.dmg · Apple silicon and Intel

Download

Homebrew

brew install --cask l8git

Windows

.msi · WebView2 ships with Windows

Download

winget

winget install l8git

Linux

.deb / .AppImage · WebKitGTK required

Download

AUR

yay -S l8git

Flatpak

flatpak install l8git

What you need

git available on your PATH
macOS 11+, Windows 10+, or a Linux distribution with WebKitGTK
No account, no licence key, no telemetry enabled by default
Optional: an AI provider key, or a local Ollama install

Getting started guide All releases

Or build it yourself

It is open source — you never have to trust a binary you did not produce. Needs Bun and a Rust toolchain; platform prerequisites are listed in the README.

Clone the repository

git clone https://github.com/Leon-Achteresch/l8git.git

Install dependencies with Bun

cd l8git && bun install

Run the desktop app in development

bun run tauri dev

Or produce an installer for your platform

bun run tauri build

FAQs

The questions people actually ask before switching Git clients.

Something missing? Open a discussion on GitHub.

Download l8git

macOS

Windows

Linux

What you need

Or build it yourself

FAQs

Is l8git really free, and does it stay that way?

What makes it different from GitHub Desktop, Sourcetree or GitKraken?

Is it an Electron app?

Which Git hosts are supported?

Do I have to use the AI features?

Where are my credentials stored?

Can I see exactly what git commands it runs?

Does it work with large monorepos?

How do I contribute?