Lean Zsh

Zsh has power. But most setups drown in plugins, bloated prompts, and slow startup times. Lean Zsh strips it to the bone—pure speed, sharp focus, zero waste. It’s the shell that starts fast and stays fast, ready to run whatever you throw at it.

A Lean Zsh configuration keeps only what matters: syntax highlighting, autosuggestions, completion. No redundant frameworks, no tangled dependencies. You choose minimal plugins written with efficiency in mind, often in pure shell. You load them with a plugin manager that respects startup performance, like znap or zinit with deferred loading. Every extra millisecond is tracked and removed.

Startup time comes down to ruthless auditing. Measure with

zsh -i -c exit

and cut what’s slowing you down. Heavy themes? Replace with a clean prompt. Large plugin bundles? Swap for single-purpose tools. Precompile completions. Cache what doesn’t change.

Lean Zsh is not just fast—it’s predictable. Every command responds the same way, whether it’s the first call of the day or your hundredth. That stability matters when you live in the terminal, switching contexts, running tasks, testing code.

A lightweight shell environment supports deeper focus. There’s nothing between you and your work. No lag. No noise. Just commands and results.

Want to see it live in minutes? Build and run Lean Zsh directly on hoop.dev—strip it, tune it, and feel the speed yourself.