Insomnia vs iTerm2
The ultimate side-by-side head-to-head analysis for 2026.
Short answer
- Price: not directly comparable — Insomnia is free tier available, iTerm2 is free.
- How to start: Insomnia is free tier available, iTerm2 is free.
These lines are generated from the pricing we track, not from a paid placement. We do not publish a quality score, because we do not have one we can stand behind. They cannot tell you which tool fits your workflow — the sections below are there for that. How we score tools.
Insomnia
iTerm2
Category
Developer Tools
Developer Tools
Base Price
Free tier
Free
Public API
Yes
No
Mobile app
No
No
Open source / self-hostable
Yes
Yes
SSO (SAML)
Yes
No
Choose Insomnia if:
Developers who want to test APIs without a heavy platform.
Choose iTerm2 if:
Mac users who spend real time in a terminal.
Insomnia: pros & cons
- Clean interface that stays out of the way
- Supports GraphQL and gRPC as first class
- Open-source core
- Smaller ecosystem than Postman
- Team features require a paid plan
- Account requirement irritates some users
iTerm2: pros & cons
- Free and mature
- Split panes and session restore
- Deeply configurable
- macOS only
- Configuration surface is large
- Interface is functional rather than modern
Our verdict on Insomnia
A lighter alternative to Postman. If your team already lives in Postman collections, switching costs more than it saves.
Our verdict on iTerm2
The long-standing default on macOS, and still free. Newer terminals win on polish, not capability.