NovaTerm

Next-generation Android terminal emulator. Rust-powered, GPU-accelerated, AI-native. Runs on any Android 11+ phone.

Modern UI (Kotlin + Jetpack Compose) with a Rust core (wgpu + alacritty_terminal) and on-device AI. Built for developers who live in the terminal — from budget phones to flagships.

Highlights

• GPU-accelerated — Vulkan compute shaders via wgpu (Adreno, Mali, PowerVR, Xclipse)
• Rust core — VT parser (alacritty_terminal), PTY, renderer — 177 tests
• AI-first — API key management, one-tap AI tool installer, session presets
• On-device AI — Gemma 4 E2B for command suggestions, no cloud needed
• AI CLI ready — Optimized for Claude Code, Gemini CLI, Aider, Codex
• PiP floating window — Multitask with a floating terminal overlay
• 7 color schemes — Gruvbox, Catppuccin, Solarized, Monokai, Nord, Dracula
• Session persistence — Survives app kill, boot restore, crash-safe history
• MCP server — 6 tools for AI agents to control the terminal
• Touch-first — 48dp targets, swipe tabs, extra keys with popups

Features

Category	Features
Terminal	Truecolor, 10K scrollback, bracketed paste, Unicode/emoji, OSC 52 clipboard (64KB), synchronized output (DEC 2026), DECSET 45
AI	Shift+Enter (CSI 13;2u), OSC 133 semantic prompts, OSC 9 notifications, TERM_PROGRAM detection, API key management, AI tool installer, session presets, AI Coding extra keys
Sessions	Swipe tabs, rename, close confirmation, SQLite block store, CAS dedup, scrollback configurable 1K-50K, session presets
Shell	Professional .profile/.bashrc/.inputrc, XDG dirs, storage symlinks, command-not-found handler
UX	History search, clickable URLs/IPs/paths, smart notifications, OEM battery guides, PiP floating window, voice input, dynamic shortcuts
Security	MCP approval manager, blocked commands, localhost-only, no telemetry

Architecture

app/                    Kotlin + Compose — UI, Service, ViewModel
core/
  bootstrap/            First-launch package extraction (bash, apt, coreutils)
  common/               Shared contracts and models
  session/              Session lifecycle, Rust JNI bridge, SQLite persistence
  terminal-emulator/    VT parser + PTY JNI (from Termux, Apache 2.0)
  terminal-view/        Canvas renderer + gestures (from Termux, Apache 2.0)
  mcp/                  AI agent protocol server (6 tools)
  llm/                  On-device LLM (Gemma 4 E2B, GGUF)
feature/
  terminal/             Terminal UI, extra keys, entity detection, color palettes
  settings/             Preferences, color scheme picker, model download
  oem-compat/           OEM detection + battery optimization guides
rust-core/              Cargo workspace — 4 crates, 177 tests
  novaterm-vt/          VT parser (alacritty_terminal 0.25.1)
  novaterm-bridge/      JNI bridge (23 exports)
  novaterm-pty/         Safe Rust PTY (replaces C)
  novaterm-renderer/    GPU renderer (wgpu 29, Vulkan compute shaders)

Build

# Debug APK
./gradlew assembleDebug

# Tests (Kotlin — 270+ tests)
./gradlew test

# Rust tests (177 tests)
cd rust-core && cargo test --workspace

# Rust with Vulkan GPU
./build-android.sh --release --vulkan

Requirements

• Android SDK (compileSdk 36, minSdk 30)
• JDK 17
• Rust 1.80+ (for rust-core)
• NDK 27+ (for cross-compilation)

Building on Termux

NovaTerm can be built directly on Android:

# Rust compiles natively (no cargo-ndk needed)
cd rust-core && cargo build -p novaterm-bridge --features gpu --release

# Full APK (requires aapt2 ARM64 package)
pkg install aapt2
./gradlew assembleDebug

Roadmap

• Phase 1 — Functional terminal with bootstrap + Termux packages
• Phase 2a — Rust core (4 crates, 177 tests, JNI bridge)
• Phase 2b — Vulkan GPU renderer (wgpu compute shaders)
• Phase 3 — AI integration (MCP server, Gemma 4, predictions)
• Phase 4 — Desktop mode (Android 16+) + plugin system

Contributing

See CONTRIBUTING.md for development setup and guidelines.

Security

See SECURITY.md for our security policy and vulnerability reporting.

License

Apache License 2.0. See LICENSE.

Terminal emulation core from Termux (Apache 2.0).