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charmbracelet/freeze: Generate images of code and terminal output 📸

URL
https://github.com/charmbracelet/freeze

Freeze

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Generate images of code and terminal output.

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Examples

Freeze generates PNGs, SVGs, and WebPs of code and terminal output alike.

Generate an image of code

freeze artichoke.hs -o artichoke.png
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Generate an image of terminal output

You can use freeze to capture ANSI output of a terminal command with the --execute flag.

freeze --execute "eza -lah"
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Freeze is also super customizable and ships with an interactive TUI.

Installation

# macOS or Linux
brew install charmbracelet/tap/freeze

# Arch Linux (btw)
yay -S freeze

# Nix
nix-env -iA nixpkgs.charm-freeze

Or, download it:

  • Packages are available in Debian and RPM formats
  • Binaries are available for Linux, macOS, and Windows

Or, just install it with go:

go install github.com/charmbracelet/freeze@latest

Customization

Interactive mode

Freeze features a fully interactive mode for easy customization.

freeze --interactive
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Settings are written to $XDG_CONFIG/freeze/user.json and can be accessed with freeze --config user.

Flags

Screenshots can be customized with --flags or Configuration files.

Note

You can view all freeze customization with freeze --help.

  • b, -background: Apply a background fill.
  • c, -config: Base configuration file or template.
  • l, -language: Language to apply to code
  • m, -margin: Apply margin to the window.
  • o, -output: Output location for .svg, .png, .jpg.
  • p, -padding: Apply padding to the code.
  • r, -border.radius: Corner radius of window.
  • t, -theme: Theme to use for syntax highlighting.
  • w, -window: Display window controls.
  • H, -height: Height of terminal window.
  • -border.width: Border width thickness.
  • -border.color: Border color.
  • -shadow.blur: Shadow Gaussian Blur.
  • -shadow.x: Shadow offset x coordinate.
  • -shadow.y: Shadow offset y coordinate.
  • -font.family: Font family to use for code.
  • -font.ligatures: Use ligatures in the font.
  • -font.size: Font size to use for code.
  • -font.file: File path to the font to use (embedded in the SVG).
  • -line-height: Line height relative to font size.
  • -show-line-numbers: Show line numbers.
  • -lines: Lines to capture (start,end).

Language

If possible, freeze auto-detects the language from the file name or analyzing the file contents. Override this inference with the --language flag.

cat artichoke.hs | freeze --language haskell
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Theme

Change the color theme.

freeze artichoke.hs --theme dracula
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Output

Change the output file location, defaults to out.svg or stdout if piped. This value supports .svg, .png, .webp.

freeze main.go --output out.svg
freeze main.go --output out.png
freeze main.go --output out.webp

# or all of the above
freeze main.go --output out.{svg,png,webp}

Font

Specify the font family, font size, and font line height of the output image. Defaults to JetBrains Mono, 14(px), 1.2(em).

freeze artichoke.hs \
  --font.family "SF Mono" \
  --font.size 16 \
  --line-height 1.4

You can also embed a font file (in TTF, WOFF, or WOFF2 format) using the --font.file flag.

To use ligatures in the font, you can apply the --font.ligatures flag.

Line Numbers

Show line numbers in the terminal window with the --show-line-numbers flag.

freeze artichoke.hs --show-line-numbers

To capture only a specific range of line numbers you can use the --lines flag.

freeze artichoke.hs --show-line-numbers --lines 2,3

Border Radius

Add rounded corners to the terminal.

freeze artichoke.hs --border.radius 8
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Window

Add window controls to the terminal, macOS-style.

freeze artichoke.hs --window
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Background

Set the background color of the terminal window.

freeze artichoke.hs --background "#08163f"

Height

Set the height of the terminal window.

freeze artichoke.hs --height 400

Border Width

Add a border outline to the terminal window.

freeze artichoke.hs --border.width 1 --border.color "#515151" --border.radius 8
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Padding

Add padding to the terminal window. You can provide 1, 2, or 4 values.

freeze main.go --padding 20          # all sides
freeze main.go --padding 20,40       # vertical, horizontal
freeze main.go --padding 20,60,20,40 # top, right, bottom, left
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Margin

Add margin to the terminal window. You can provide 1, 2, or 4 values.

freeze main.go --margin 20          # all sides
freeze main.go --margin 20,40       # vertical, horizontal
freeze main.go --margin 20,60,20,40 # top, right, bottom, left
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Shadow

Add a shadow under the terminal window.

freeze artichoke.hs --shadow.blur 20 --shadow.x 0 --shadow.y 10

Screenshot TUIs

Use tmux capture-pane to generate screenshots of TUIs.

Run your TUI in tmux and get it to the state you want to capture. Next, use capture-pane to capture the pane and pipe that to freeze.

hx # in a separate pane
tmux capture-pane -pet 1 | freeze -c full
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Configuration

Freeze also supports configuration via a JSON file which can be passed with the --config / -c flag. In general, all --flag options map directly to keys and values in the config file

There are also some default configurations built into freeze which can be passed by name.

  • base: Simple screenshot of code.
  • full: macOS-like screenshot.
  • user: Uses ~/.config/freeze/user.json.

If you use --interactive mode, a configuration file will be created for you at ~/.config/freeze/user.json. This will be the default configuration file used in your screenshots.

freeze -c base main.go
freeze -c full main.go
freeze -c user main.go # alias for ~/.config/freeze/user.json
freeze -c ./custom.json main.go

Here's what an example configuration looks like:

{
  "window": false,
  "border": {
    "radius": 0,
    "width": 0,
    "color": "#515151"
  },
  "shadow": false,
  "padding": [20, 40, 20, 20],
  "margin": "0",
  "font": {
    "family": "JetBrains Mono",
    "size": 14
  },
  "line_height": 1.2
}

Feedback

We’d love to hear your thoughts on this project. Feel free to drop us a note!

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License

MIT

Part of Charm.

Charm热爱开源 • Charm loves open source

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Made with Notion, Published on Super - 2026 © Stephane Boghossian

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