Installing Emacs on OS X

2017-04-26T15:55:40Z

192.40.239.178: Brew now recommends emacs to be installed as "brew cask install emacs"

OS X comes with a preinstalled version of Emacs, but alas it is the outdated Emacs 22. Fortunately, obtaining a newer release is really simple. There are several popular ways to do it.

== Emacs 24 ==

=== As a binary package ===

Simply download a binary from [http://emacsformacosx.com Emacs for OSX].

The above binary distribution bundled with up-to-date versions [http://www.gnu.org/software/auctex/ AUCTeX], [http://ess.r-project.org ESS] and a few other useful tools is available
from [http://vgoulet.act.ulaval.ca/en/emacs/mac/ Vincent Goulet's web site].

=== MacPorts ===

If you have [https://www.macports.org/ MacPorts] installed, you can just do:

<source lang="bash">
$ sudo port install emacs
</source>

to install Emacs 24. The MacPorts installer updates your PATH environment variable, so the MacPorts build of Emacs should be found by your shell before the (outdated) build that comes with Mac OS when you type 'emacs'. If you prefer the Emacs.app build, that's available by executing:

<source lang="bash">
$ sudo port install emacs-app
</source>

=== Homebrew ===

Emacs 25 is also available via [http://mxcl.github.com/homebrew/homebrew]. Just type the following incantation in your shell and you’re done:

<source lang="bash">
$ brew update
$ brew install emacs --with-cocoa
$ brew linkapps emacs
</source>
The second step is optional, but it’s recommended if you like to start Emacs from the launchpad or from Spotlight.

Chances are good you have an older version of Emacs installed by default with OS X. It's suggested you to remove that older Emacs version to avoid conflicts with the new one. Do this:

<source lang="bash">
$ sudo rm /usr/bin/emacs
$ sudo rm -rf /usr/share/emacs
</source>

Or just create an alias in your shell and when you invoke 'emacs' it will run the newly installed version:

<source lang="bash">
$ alias emacs="/usr/local/Cellar/emacs/24.x/Emacs.app/Contents/MacOS/Emacs -nw"
</source>

To make it permanent, if using bash, add that line to ~/.bash_profile.

That’s all folks! You may now proceed to the configuration section.

=== Homebrew recommended by brew ===

Brew now recommends emacs to be installed as
<source lang="bash">
brew cask install emacs
</source>
But that doesn't create /usr/local/bin/emacs.

You may follow [https://emacsformacosx.com/tips Emacs for Mac OS X, Tips] on how to create scripts for running emacs and emacsclient.

=== Rudix ===

Emacs is easy to install directly from [http://rudix.org Rudix] as a .pkg or with the Rudix command line tool:

<source lang="bash">
% sudo rudix install emacs
</source>

== Emacs 23 ==

Binaries for Emacs 23 are still available from [http://emacsformacosx.com/builds Emacs for OSX].

== Aquamacs ==

A near-OS-X-native port of GNU Emacs, integrating Emacs with all the features of Mac OS X. Available [http://aquamacs.org/ here]. As of January 2015, the latest version (3.2) is based on Emacs 24.4. Comes bundled with some handy packages like [[AUCTeX]].

[[Category:OS X]][[Category:Beginner]][[Category:Install Or Upgrade]][[Category:Emacs-23]][[Category:Emacs-23.4]][[Category:Emacs-24]]

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Installing Emacs on OS X