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url: https://github.com/orhun/ratty date_fetched: 2026-07-05 backfilled: true

Ratty: A GPU-rendered terminal emulator with inline 3D graphics 🧀

Inspired by TempleOS | Built with Rust & Ratatui

ratty-demo-with-audio.mp4

"Rodent-obsessed developer creates Ratty to bring 3D graphics to the command line" - The Register

"This New Terminal is Absurd (But Totally Fun)" - It's FOSS

"10 weird OSS projects you need right now... " - Fireship

"Your terminal can render in 3D now, and Rust made it surprisingly usable" - MakeUseOf

Spinning rat cursor (customizable)
Traditional 2D and new 3D mode!
Inline 3D objects
GPU-backed text rendering
Image support (via Kitty Graphics Protocol >:()

📚 Read the behind the scenes blog post here!

Ever wondered what's behind the terminal? Press Ctrl+Alt+Enter!

ratty-3d-with-audio.mp4

Requirements:

A GPU / graphics stack supported by Bevy and wgpu
Melted cheese (optional but recommended)

cargo install ratty``sudo pacman -S rattySee the Nix packaging docs for flake, NixOS, and Home Manager usage.

nix run github:orhun/rattyPrebuilt binaries are available on the GitHub releases page for direct download.

Requirements:

Rust toolchain with Cargo
on Bazzite / Bluefin: sudo rpm-ostree install gcc fontconfig-devel wayland-devel(then reboot)
on Debian / Ubuntu: sudo apt-get update ; sudo apt-get install gcc pkgconf libfontconfig-dev libwayland-dev
on Fedora: sudo dnf install gcc fontconfig-devel wayland-devel

cargo install --git https://github.com/orhun/rattyThe default configuration file is available in config/ratty.toml.

You can copy this file to $HOME/.config/ratty/ratty.toml and customize it.

[cursor.model]
path = "CairoSpinyMouse.obj"
scale_factor = 6.0
brightness = 0.5
x_offset = 0.5
plane_offset = 18.0
visible = true
[cursor.animation]
spin_speed = 1.4
bob_speed = 2.2
bob_amplitude = 0.08

For cursor.model.path, Ratty supports both .obj, .glb, and .stl assets.

Other useful cursor fields are:

scale_factor: scales the model relative to the terminal cell size
brightness: adjusts the cursor material brightness
x_offset: shifts the cursor model horizontally inside the cell
plane_offset: pushes the cursor away from the warped terminal surface in 3D mode
visible: show the custom 3D cursor model instead of only the terminal cursor

Key	Action
Ctrl+Alt+C	Copy selection
Ctrl+Alt+V	Paste clipboard
Ctrl+Alt+Enter	Toggle 2D / 3D mode
Ctrl+Alt+M	Toggle Mobius mode
Ctrl+Alt+Up	Increase warp
Ctrl+Alt+Down	Decrease warp
Alt+PageUp	Scroll one page up
Alt+PageDown	Scroll one page down
Alt+Up	Scroll one line up
Alt+Down	Scroll one line down
Ctrl+=	Increase font size
Ctrl+-	Decrease font size
Ctrl+Alt+0	Reset font size

Ratty uses its own protocol, the Ratty Graphics Protocol, to place inline 3D objects in terminal space.

RGP supports:

registering .obj,.glb, and.stlassets by path
placing them at terminal cell anchors
animation, scale, color, depth and other attributes

There is a Ratatui widget called ratatui-rgp available in widget/ if you want to build your own terminal applications that involve inline 3D objects.

Places a single oversized rat directly in your terminal:

ratty-big-rat-with-audio.mp4

TempleOS-inspired document demo with editable text and embedded inline 3D objects:

ratty-document-with-audio.mp4

Split-pane drawing demo with a 2D canvas on the left and a live 3D preview on the right:

ratty-draw-with-audio.mp4

Interactive 3D Rubik's cube demo:

ratty-rubiks-cube.mp4

Here are some applications explicitly built around Ratty's Graphics Protocol:

Terminal CAD:

ratscad-demo.mp4

Endless runner built for Ratty:

ratty-run.mp4

A blazingly fast serial monitor with plotter TUI and 3D telemetry

2026-05-23_18-01-42.mp4

The terminal surface currently uses ratatui for the UI buffer, parley_ratatui for text shaping/rendering and Bevy for scene presentation.

Current workflow:

Ratatui buffer on CPU
Parley/Vello renders on GPU
Read back RGBA to CPU
Copy into Bevy image
Bevy presents that image in 2D and 3D

Terminal drawing is GPU-rendered through Parley/Vello, but the main terminal image still crosses back through CPU memory before Bevy presents it. This is a GPU-powered bridge, not a fully GPU-resident shared-texture path.

If the project later moves to a fully GPU-resident path, that will require a dedicated Bevy render integration that renders into a Bevy-owned texture on Bevy's render-world device instead of using the current readback bridge.

"This is like a legitimately cool project but also I just spent like 20 minutes adjusting the config for the rat spinning to see him spin faster and more erratically and it cracked me up"- @vimlena.com

bluesky-video-1777558230431.mp4

"These kinds of experiments are where creativity is born."- @Coko7
"No comments. Just support."- @Raphamorim (creator of Rio terminal)

Screencast.from.2026-05-04.12-11-50.webm

All code is licensed under The MIT License.

🦀 ノ( º _ º ノ) - respect crables!

Ratty logo designed by @Strophox & @Harunocaksiz

The author does not have a rat under the hat!