Hyperlinks

Status: Extension (VTE 0.50, 2017).

OSC 8 attaches a URI to a run of printed text. The text renders normally; the emulator makes it clickable and may underline it on hover. Unlike heuristic URL detection, the visible text and the target can differ.

Syntax

OSC 8 ; params ; URI ST   start a link
text
OSC 8 ; ; ST              end the link

params is a :-separated list of key=value pairs; only id is defined. An empty URI ends the current link. The URI is not percent-encoded by the terminal; the application must produce a valid URI.

printf '\033]8;;https://example.com\033\\Example\033]8;;\033\\\n'
printf '\033]8;id=a1;https://example.com\033\\two\033]8;;\033\\ '
printf '\033]8;id=a1;https://example.com\033\\cells\033]8;;\033\\\n'

Behavior

• A link is an attribute of each cell, like a color. It survives scrolling into scrollback and is cleared by erase operations that reset attributes.
• Cells with the same URI and the same non-empty id form one logical link even when separated by other cells or wrapped across lines. Without an id, adjacent cells with the same URI are usually treated as one link; cells on different lines with the same URI but no id are separate links.
• Emulators apply a scheme allowlist. http, https, file, mailto, and ftp are near-universal; VTE additionally accepts a fixed set, kitty and foot let configuration decide, and some emulators pass everything to the OS URL opener. A scheme outside the allowlist is dropped without an error.
• Rendering is not specified. VTE shows nothing until hover; kitty, foot, and WezTerm underline on hover by default and can underline always; iTerm2 underlines on modifier-hover. Applications must not depend on visual feedback to indicate a link.
• URI length is capped (VTE: 2083 bytes, matching Internet Explorer's old limit); longer links are ignored.

Applications should emit the link end sequence explicitly rather than relying on line breaks or resets, and should not open an OSC 8 that spans a scroll region change.

xterm does not implement OSC 8; its maintainer has stated that the design cannot be made safe for the visible-text/target mismatch. Programs that gate on TERM=xterm* to decide whether to emit links will therefore be wrong in both directions.

xterm+ interaction policy

xterm+ is distinct from upstream xterm and does implement OSC 8 through its libghostty-vt terminal core. Hold Shift while hovering to underline linked cells, then use Shift+Button 1 to activate a target. The press and release must occur on the same target while Shift remains held.

Only http:// and https:// targets are passed to xdg-open. Other schemes still receive hover feedback but are inert. xterm+ invokes the opener directly with the URI as one argument, without a shell, and does not recognize plain URL-looking text as a link.

Probe

tools/sendosc link https://example.com 'Example link'
printf '\033]8;;mailto:test@example.com\033\\mail\033]8;;\033\\\n'
printf '\033]8;;javascript:alert(1)\033\\should not open\033]8;;\033\\\n'

Hover or click the output. The third line tests the scheme allowlist. In xterm+, hold Shift while hovering or clicking; only the first link opens.

Sources

• Hyperlinks (a.k.a. HTML-like anchors) in terminal emulators
• VTE 0.50 release notes
• xterm FAQ, OSC 8
• kitty: hyperlinks
• foot(1), OSC 8
• Windows Terminal 1.4 release notes
• xterm.js hyperlinks
• tmux 3.4 CHANGES

Compatibility

Feature support by terminal. Imported claims have not been reverified; unknown is not unsupported.

Feature / stable ID	Alacritty	Apple Terminal	ConPTY (conhost)	Contour	DomTerm	foot	Ghostty	iTerm2	kitty	Konsole	mintty	mlterm	PuTTY	Revenant	RLogin	st	tmux	rxvt-unicode	VTE	wayst	WezTerm	Windows Terminal	xterm	xterm.js
OSC 8 hyperlinks osc-8-hyperlinks	SupportedImported · unverified	Unknown	Unknown	SupportedImported · unverified	Unknown	SupportedImported · unverified	SupportedImported · unverified	SupportedImported · unverified	SupportedImported · unverified	SupportedImported · unverified	SupportedImported · unverified	Unknown	Unknown	Partial	Unknown	Unknown	SupportedImported · unverified	Unknown	SupportedImported · unverified	Unknown	SupportedImported · unverified	SupportedImported · unverified	UnsupportedImported · unverified	SupportedImported · unverified
id= grouping osc-8-link-id	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	SupportedImported · unverified	Unknown	Unknown	SupportedImported · unverified	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	SupportedImported · unverified	Unknown	SupportedImported · unverified	Unknown	SupportedImported · unverified	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown