When comparing Magnet vs TextWrangler, the Slant community recommends Magnet for most people. In the question“What are the best power user tools for macOS?” Magnet is ranked 51st while TextWrangler is ranked 65th. The most important reason people chose Magnet is:
Easy to learn keyboard shortcuts.
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Pros
Pro Keyboard centric
Easy to learn keyboard shortcuts.
Pro Intuitive handling
Just drag the window to one of the sides of the screen and it snaps there. This is especially useful for those who can't be bothered remembering the shortcuts.
Pro Cheap
At $0.99, it is not that expensive.
Pro Mouse controllable
Supports dragging a window along the edges of the screen to activate.
Pro Do not have to learn or remember keyboard shortcuts
Pro It's often on sale
For example, at the writing of this pro it's currently at $1.
Pro Up to six external displays supported
Pro Fast to start up
It starts up fast because is not bloated. It has all the essentials of a text editor.
Pro Free
Free but capable alternative to BBEdit.
Pro Built-in FTP/STFP browser
Edit remote files easily.
Pro Robust
Cons
Con Cannot setup custom sizes and window positions
Unfortunately, you can only move windows to preset positions.
Con Can only be purchased from the App Store
Magnet is only available in App Store.
Con Can't hide the menu bar icon
It would've been nice to be able to hide the icon so it doesn't clutter the menu bar.
Con Interference when switching between folders
Default Folder-X app "warns" that Magnet App may interfere with it's ability to switch between folders in Open and Save dialogue boxes.
Con Causes cursor bugs in IntelliJ IDEs
Unfortunately, Magnet causes the caret to bounce around in IntelliJ IDEs, this is very annoying.
Con No Longer Maintained
Bare Bones, the developers of TextWranger, recently ended maintenance and support for the product. Per the Bare Bones website (https://www.barebones.com/products/textwrangler/): "We have sunsetted TextWrangler, and we encourage anyone interested in TextWrangler to download and use BBEdit instead."
Con Not Compatible with macOS High Sierra (10.13+)
Per the Bare Bones website (https://www.barebones.com/support/new-os.html): "TextWrangler is not compatible with High Sierra. We suggest that you use BBEdit as an alternative . . . ." Since Bare Bones officially sunsetted the product, it will unlikely be compatible with subsequent macOS release versions either.
Con Featureless
