Add to Chrome
Add to Edge
Add to Firefox
Add to Opera
Add to Brave
Add to SafariWhen comparing Linkinus 2 vs Textual, the Slant community recommends Textual for most people. In the question“What are the best IRC clients for Mac?” Textual is ranked 2nd while Linkinus 2 is ranked 5th. The most important reason people chose Textual is:
Textual was developed just for Mac, so there's no need to worry about compatibility issues. It can be downloaded straight from the App Store and takes full advantage of Macs native features such as the Notification Center.
Question Ranking
Pros
Pro Major improvements over first version
With the new version release, Linkinus 2 is up to 10 times faster. It also has new core features such as auto reconnect, proxy support and much more.
Pro Searchable logs
Linkinus 2 lets you search chat logs by keyword within the app. You can also enable or disable logging on a per-channel basis.
Pro An extensive feature set
For those looking for a feature packed client, Linkinus 2 is for you. The $8 USD price point is almost justifiable by the feature list. It frovides features not seen in other IRC clients such as embedded media(Youtube, Vimeo, etc.) and can automatically expand shortened URLs.
Pro Native to Mac
Textual was developed just for Mac, so there's no need to worry about compatibility issues. It can be downloaded straight from the App Store and takes full advantage of Macs native features such as the Notification Center.
Pro Designed with simplicity in mind
Textual was built to be simple and easy to use. It is very clean and has features for both IRC newbies and power-users.
Pro Full-featured
Textual provides a wide range of features for any level of IRC user. It has basic options such as:
- Native Fullscreen support
- Native Notification Center support
- Wide range of keyboard shortcuts
And plenty of other basic features you would expect from a quality IRC client. It also has a plethora of advanced features for those looking to get under the hood:
- SOCK4 and SOCK5 support
- Full, native support for IPv6 users.
- Direct Client-to-Client (DCC) file transfer support
And many other customization options, such as theming.
Pro Regularly maintained and updated
The team at textual is always working on updating and getting rid of bugs in Textual which means its always improving.
Pro Can be used for free if you build it yourself
Textual is open source and includes instructions for building it. You can set the TEXTUAL_BUILT_WITH_LICENSE_MANAGER flag to 0 to skip trial/license popups.
Pro Open source
Source code is available here.
Pro Proxy support
Textual can proxy your connection to IRC servers through SOCKS4 / SOCKS5 on a per-server basis.
Pro Full, native support for IPv6
Pro ZNC integration
Support for ZNC out of the box, including history.
Cons
Con Abandonware
Con More expensive than most IRC clients
At $7.99 USD on the App Store, Linkinus 2 is more expensive than most IRC clients. While the extensive features may justify the price for some, basic users probably do not need to pay for a commercial client.
Con No Notification Center support.
Linkinus 2 does not support OSX's Notification Center meaning you'll have to keep an eye on the window as you won't be getting alerts straight to your desktop.
Con No DCC chat support
Con Requires payment (unless compiled from source)
Textual is a paid product, but can be used for free if you compile it yourself.
Con Unreliable when having network issues
If you are using VPNs, your connectivity with the IRC servers may drop and you will find it almost useless. It is able to reconnect, but is not able to rejoin the channels when it reconnects.
