A free, open-source alternative to Termius

Why people look for a Termius alternative

Termius is a polished cross-platform SSH client. It is also closed source, built around a Termius account with cloud sync, and sells part of its feature set as paid subscription plans. If you want an SSH client whose code you can audit, whose data stays on your machine, and whose price doesn't depend on a plan, those trade-offs matter.

What you keep when you switch

• Saved hosts in nested groups with inherited settings, tags and search — and one-step import from your existing ~/.ssh/config.
• An SFTP file manager with side-by-side panes, drag and drop, resumable transfers and a queue you can pause.
• Jump hosts drawn as a visible chain (bastion → internal → database) that reuses saved credentials.
• Local, remote and dynamic port forwarding (-L / -R / -D) with saved rules and live traffic stats.
• Snippets, command history, a command palette, and broadcasting one command to several hosts.
• Ed25519, RSA and ECDSA key generation, plus an encrypted vault for passwords and keys.

What Shellium does differently

• Open source under Apache-2.0. The full source is on GitHub, so you can audit how credentials are handled and build it yourself.
• Your data stays local. The optional master-password vault uses Argon2id and XChaCha20-Poly1305 and never syncs to a cloud service.
• The file manager follows nested ssh. Type ssh inside a session and Shellium takes over that hop, so the SFTP pane moves to the server you're actually on, tunnelled through the right jump hosts.
• A native Qt/C++ app rather than a bundled browser, with a libvterm terminal that handles vim, top, true colour and CJK text correctly.
• Free with no tiers: every feature is available to everyone.

When Termius may still suit you better

Shellium is a desktop app. If you need SSH on an iPhone or Android phone, or want hosts synced across devices and shared with a team through a hosted service, Termius covers that and Shellium does not.

Shellium and Termius at a glance

Frequently asked questions

Is Shellium really free?

Yes. Shellium is free for personal and commercial use, with no paid tiers, trial or license key. It is open source under the Apache License 2.0.

Can I bring my hosts over from Termius?

Shellium imports hosts from an OpenSSH config file (~/.ssh/config). If your hosts are already in your SSH config, import that file; otherwise add them once in Shellium's host tree, where groups let child hosts inherit settings.

Do I need an account?

No. There is no sign-up. Everything is stored on your machine, and the vault is protected by a master password only you know.

Which platforms are supported?

macOS (Apple Silicon and Intel), Windows 10 and 11 (x64 and ARM64), and Linux (x86_64 and aarch64, as AppImage, .deb, .rpm or Flatpak).

Is it safe to use with production servers?

Shellium verifies host keys on first connection, enables legacy algorithms only per host after you confirm, and creates private keys with restrictive permissions. Because it is open source, you can review that code yourself.