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Comparison of file comparison tools

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This is an old revision of this page, as edited by 87.120.6.146 (talk) at 13:04, 10 April 2008 (→Features). The present address (URL) is a permanent link to this revision, which may differ significantly from the current revision.

General

Basic general information about file comparison software.

Name Creator Software license Cost First public release date Latest stable version Windows Macintosh Linux Other platforms
Altova DiffDog Altova Proprietary USD 129 (single license), with a free 30 day trial version available 2007 Yes (Win NT, 2000 & XP) No No
Araxis Merge Araxis Ltd Proprietary USD 129 (std) - 269 (pro) 1993 2007.3225 (Apr 10, 2007) Yes Yes (under development, but stable enough to be used) No
Beyond Compare Scooter Software Proprietary USD 30 2.5.2 (Nov 21, 2007) Yes (Win95 and up) No No
ECMerge Ellié Computing Proprietary from USD 30 (std) / USD 60 (pro) / floating licence 2005 2.1 (October 22, 2007 Yes (Win98 and up) Yes (Mac OS X) Yes Sun Solaris
Compare It! Grig Software Proprietary USD 29 3.86 (Jan 8, 2006) Yes No No
Deltopia DeltaWalker Deltopia Inc Proprietary Personal: 30 (std), 60 (oro); Commercial: 100 (std), 190 (oro); all USD 2007 2007 (1.5.6 Dec 3, 2007) Yes Yes (Mac OS X) Yes
diff GNU Project Free - 1974 Yes Yes (Mac OS X) Yes
diff3 GNU Project Free - Yes Yes (Mac OS X) Yes
Diff Commander Nikeware Proprietary USD 29 2005 2.0 (Feb 26, 2007) Yes No No
DiffDaff cyberpromote Freeware - 1.0.0 (June 6, 2006) Yes No No
Softinterface Diff Doc Softinterface Proprietary USD 199 (single license), with a free 30 day Doc' trial version available 2002 2007.3225 (Jun 06, 2007) Yes (Windows 98-Vista and up) No No
DiffMerge SourceGear Proprietary Free 2003 3.1 (Oct 10, 2007) Yes Yes Yes
Eclipse Compare Free - Yes Yes (Mac OS X) Yes Anything with Java
Ediff Michael Kifer GPL - Yes Yes (Mac OS X) Yes Anything with Emacs
ExamDiff Pro PrestoSoft Proprietary USD 35, with a free version available (ExamDiff) 1998 3.5.1.2 (Apr 6, 2007) Yes (Win98 and up) No No
fc Microsoft Proprietary Part of OS Yes (DOS) No No
FileMerge AppleComputer, Inc. Proprietary Free (part of Apple Developer Tools) 2.2.1 (2005) No Yes (Mac OS X) No
Guiffy SureMerge Guiffy Software Proprietary Single user USD 66 / Mutli-user USD 44 per user 2000 8.4 (Mar 25, 2008) Yes Yes Yes Anything with Java
IntelliJ IDEA Compare JetBrains Proprietary Part of application 6.0.5 (2007) Yes Yes Yes
KDiff3 Joachim Eibl GPL - 2002 0.9.92 (Apr 15, 2007) Yes Yes (Mac OS X) Yes
Kompare Otto Bruggeman GPL - 3.5.0 (Nov 29, 2005) Yes (Cygwin) No Yes
LizardTF Ian Cornwell GPL Free - part of LizardTF 0.1.3 (Jan 10, 2008) Yes (Inc. 64bit) No No
Meld Stephen Kennedy GPL - 1.1.5 (June 9, 2007) No Yes (Mac OS X) Yes
SmartSynchronize SyntEvo Proprietary USD 52 2.5.1 (Mar 11, 2007) Yes Yes Yes Anything with Java
SwiftCompare Oorja Software Proprietary USD 27 1.1 (Jan 19, 2007) Yes (Win98 and up) No No
TkDiff [1] GPL - 4.1.3 (Feb 20, 2006) Yes (Tcl) Yes (Tcl) Yes (Tcl) Anything with Tcl
TortoiseMerge [2] GPL Part of TortoiseSVN 1.4.4 (June 9, 2007) Yes (Win2k and up) No No
Total Commander Compare Christian Ghisler Proprietary Part of application 7.01 (Jun 21, 2007) Yes No No
UltraCompare IDM Computer Solutions Proprietary USD 29.95 5.0 (May 18, 2007) Yes No No
vimdiff Bram Moolenaar et al GPL-compatible - 2001 7.0 (May 7, 2006) Yes Yes Yes
Visual Comparer Nikeware Proprietary USD 29 1.60 (Feb 26, 2007) Yes No No
WinDiff Microsoft Proprietary (with source code) Part of Platform SDK Yes No No
WinMerge Dean Grimm GPL - 1998 2.8.0 (April 3, 2008) Yes (Win95 and up) No No
xxdiff Martin Blais GPL - 2000 3.2 (June 30, 2006) Yes (ver. 2.9) Yes (source) Yes (source)
zsCompare Zizasoft Proprietary USD 35 (lite) USD 99.95 (std) USD 199.95 (pro) 2004 3.03 (July 6, 2006) Yes Yes Yes Anything with Java
csvdiff Roland Schmitz GPL - 2006 1.3a (April 1, 2007) Yes Yes Yes Anything with Perl
Name Creator Software license Cost First public release date Latest stable version Windows Macintosh Linux Other platforms

Features

Name GUI CLI Scripting Horizontal / Vertical Non-linear compare 3-way comparison Directory comparison Binary comparison Merge Syntax Highlighting Reports
Softinterface 'Diff Doc' Yes Yes (and Full Automation API) both No Yes No Yes Yes DOC, HTML, CSV
Araxis Merge Yes Yes (and Full Automation API) both Yes (Professional Edition only) Yes Yes Yes (since Araxis Merge 2007) Yes XML/HTML/HTML/Slideshow reports, UNIX diff
Beyond Compare Yes Yes optional No (Expected in Version 3, late 2008) Yes Yes No (Expected in Version 3) Yes
ECMerge Yes Yes (+ActiveX available) Yes ECMAScript optional Yes (optional, and ancestor can be hidden) Yes Yes Yes Yes customizable XML/HTML/CSV/text reports, UNIX diff
Deltopia DeltaWalker Yes Yes both Yes Yes Yes No Yes HTML/XML, Patch creation
diff No Yes horizontal No No Yes
diff3 No Yes horizontal No Yes (non-optional) No
DiffDaff Yes No optional No No Yes No
DiffMerge Yes No vertical Yes Yes Yes Yes No Yes
Eclipse Compare Yes vertical Yes Yes Yes Yes
Ediff Yes No both Yes Yes Yes Yes
ExamDiff Pro Yes Yes optional No Yes Yes No Yes, UNIX, HTML, and printable diff reports
Guiffy SureMerge Yes Yes (and API) both Yes Yes Yes HTML 4.01 / CSS - W3C validated
IntelliJ IDEA Compare Yes vertical Yes Yes Yes
fc No Yes horizontal No No No No
FileMerge Yes Yes ('opendiff') vertical Yes (optional, by supplying an ancestor file/directory) Yes Yes Yes No
KDiff3 Yes Yes both Yes Yes Yes Yes
Kompare Yes vertical No Yes No No
LizardTF Yes No both Yes Yes v.stamps Yes
Meld Yes Yes vertical optional Yes No Yes
SmartSynchronize Yes Yes vertical Yes Yes Yes
SwiftCompare Yes No Yes Yes Yes Yes
TkDiff Yes No
TortoiseMerge Yes Yes Yes No Yes No No
Total Commander Compare Yes optional No Yes Yes Yes
UltraCompare
vimdiff Yes Yes both Yes No Yes No
WinDiff Yes Yes horizontal Yes No Yes No No
WinMerge Yes Yes optional Yes No Yes Yes Yes No
xxdiff Yes Yes optional Yes Yes Yes Yes
zsCompare Yes Yes horizontal No Yes Yes
csvdiff No Yes No No No No Yes
Name GUI CLI Scripting Horizontal / Vertical Non-linear compare 3-way comparison Directory comparison Binary comparison Merge Syntax Highlighting Reports

Other features

Some other features which did not fit in previous table

Name ZIP support FTP support Version Control browsing Patch creation Patch application Patch preview Unicode support
Araxis Merge Yes VSS, Perforce, Subversion Yes (UNIX diff)
Beyond Compare Yes Yes Yes
ECMerge Yes Yes CVS (1.11-, 1.12+), evolution, Perforce, SVN, VSS Yes (3 formats, also for directories) Yes Yes Yes (UTF8, UTF16 LE/BE, UTF32 LE/BE)
diff No Yesfs
diff3 No Yesfs
DiffDaff No No
DiffMerge No No No Partial *
Eclipse Compare Yes
Ediff Yes Yes
ExamDiff Pro Yes (through a plug-in) Yes (through a plug-in) No
Guiffy SureMerge Yes Yes (File Compares: UTF8, UTF16, MBCS, SJIS, over 150 file encoding and character set formats, Folder Compares support Unicode file/folder names)
IntelliJ IDEA Compare
fc No No No
FileMerge No Yes (supported by OS) No
KDiff3 (on KDE via KIO) (on KDE via KIO) Partial *
Kompare Yes
LizardTF Team Foundation Server (TFS) tba tba tba Yes
Meld
SmartSynchronize No No No
SwiftCompare No (In the next release) No (In the next release)
TkDiff
TortoiseMerge No No No
Total Commander Compare Yes
UltraCompare
vimdiff Yes Yes Yes
WinDiff No No No No
WinMerge Yes No Yes Partial *
xxdiff No No
zsCompare Yes No Yes
csvdiff No No No
Name ZIP support FTP support Version Control browsing Patch creation Patch application Patch preview Unicode support
* cannot identify UTF-8 files as unicode unless they have a BOM mark in the beginning.

Aspects

What aspects can be / are compared?

Filename casing CRC Filedate Daylight saving Character casing
Araxis Merge Yes (optional) Yes (optional) Yes (optional)
Beyond Compare No Yes optional optional Optional
ECMerge Yes (parametered) Yes (CRC32/MD5) Yes (optional) Yes (optional, also filesize) Yes (optional)
diff optional Optional
diff3
DiffDaff No No No No Yes
DiffMerge Yes (platform dependent) No Yes No Yes (optional)
Eclipse Compare
Ediff
ExamDiff Pro No Yes (optional) Yes (optional) Yes (optional) Yes (optional)
Guiffy SureMerge Yes (filesystem dependent) Plus, support of Unicode file/folder names Yes (optional) Yes (optional)
IntelliJ IDEA Compare
fc No Optional
FileMerge No No No Optional
KDiff3 Yes No Yes (optional) No Optional
Kompare Yes
Meld Yes (filesystem dependend) No Yes No Yes
SmartSynchronize
SwiftCompare Yes Yes (optional) Yes (optional) Yes (optional)
TkDiff
TortoiseMerge
Total Commander Compare optional Optional
UltraCompare
vimdiff No No No No Yes
WinDiff No No when different Yes Optional
WinMerge No No Optional Optional
xxdiff
zsCompare Yes (optional) Yes (Adler32, CRC32) Yes (optional) Yes (optional) Optional
csvdiff Yes (optional) Yes (optional)

Software libraries

  • Perl (found on CPAN)
    • Algorithm::Diff
    • Array::Diff
    • Text::Diff
    • XML::Diff
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