When comparing Windows Grep vs GNU grep, the Slant community recommends GNU grep for most people. In the question“What are the best grep implementations for Windows?” GNU grep is ranked 6th while Windows Grep is ranked 9th. The most important reason people chose GNU grep is:
Since it's pretty much the same grep used on UNIX systems, people who have used grep on any *NIX system will find themselves at home with the Windows version.
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Pros
Pro Search-and-replace support
Windows Grep has support for search-and-replace text. This is very helpful if you want to edit files en-masse.
Pro Good result overview with click-support to external editor
Pro Great for people used to *NIX systems
Since it's pretty much the same grep used on UNIX systems, people who have used grep on any *NIX system will find themselves at home with the Windows version.
Pro It handles files of any size
At least in Linux.
Cons
Con Website does not seem to exist any more
Con Hasn't been updated in a while
Windows Grep hasn't had a new stable release in a while. The released version has Windows 7 listed as the latest version of Windows supported.
Con Cannot handle files
When searching through files with 10MB or more it starts having issues and even crashes depending on the file size and the machine it's running on.