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Installing ZSH and Oh My Zsh on Mac and Linux

Let’s supercharge your terminal with ZSH and Oh My Zsh. Here’s how to install them on macOS and popular Linux distributions.

What are ZSH and Oh My Zsh?

  • ZSH (Z Shell): a powerful, extensible shell that can replace bash
  • Oh My Zsh: a framework for managing ZSH configuration, with themes, plugins, and more

Installing ZSH

On macOS

Check if ZSH is already installed (it’s the default since macOS Catalina):

zsh --version

If needed, install via Homebrew:

brew install zsh

On Linux

Install according to your distribution:

# Ubuntu/Debian
sudo apt update
sudo apt install zsh

# Fedora
sudo dnf install zsh

# Arch Linux
sudo pacman -S zsh

# CentOS/RHEL
sudo yum update
sudo yum install zsh

Make ZSH your default shell

chsh -s $(which zsh)

Log out and back in to apply the change.

Install Oh My Zsh

Using curl

sh -c "$(curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/ohmyzsh/ohmyzsh/master/tools/install.sh)"

Using wget

sh -c "$(wget https://raw.githubusercontent.com/ohmyzsh/ohmyzsh/master/tools/install.sh -O -)"

Customize your terminal

Change the theme

Edit your .zshrc:

nano ~/.zshrc

Set a theme, for example:

ZSH_THEME="agnoster"

Other popular themes: robbyrussell, agnoster, avit, bira, fino, jonathan.

Add plugins

In .zshrc:

plugins=(git docker composer npm sudo web-search)
  • git, composer, laravel, npm, docker, vscode

(Optional) Install Powerlevel10k

git clone --depth=1 https://github.com/romkatv/powerlevel10k.git ${ZSH_CUSTOM:-$HOME/.oh-my-zsh/custom}/themes/powerlevel10k

Then set in .zshrc:

ZSH_THEME="powerlevel10k/powerlevel10k"

Restart the terminal to run the configuration wizard.

You now have a faster, more productive terminal. Try different themes and plugins to match your workflow. You can always switch back to bash with bash if needed.