# Powerlevel10k's README tells you up front that most bugs will go unfixed > A zsh theme whose readme opens with four capitalised lines saying the project has very limited support, that no new features are in the works, that most bugs will go unfixed and that help requests will be ignored. The last tagged release is from January 2024, master is two years past it, and one make target deletes the licence and the readme from your checkout. **romkatv/powerlevel10k** — A Zsh theme - Repository: https://github.com/romkatv/powerlevel10k - Stars: 55,171 · Forks: 2,445 - Language: Shell - License: MIT - Published: 2026-08-17 · Updated: 2026-08-18 · Language: en - Canonical page: https://hysenlabs.com/projects/romkatv-powerlevel10k ## The readme opens with four capitalised lines about support The most honest thing about this project is at the very top, above the feature list, in four lines of capitalised text. The project has very limited support. No new features are in the works. Most bugs will go unfixed. Help requests will be ignored. Nothing qualifies or softens any of them. That framing changes how you should read everything below it, because the rest of the readme goes on to describe a configuration wizard, an instant prompt, a transient prompt, compatibility with two separate predecessors and an extensive compatibility mode, and none of that is presented as being in flux. The consequence for an adopter is that this is a finished artefact rather than a project, and the documentation is a record of what the software does rather than a description of where it is going. If you need a theme that will be maintained alongside your shell, this readme is telling you not to expect that here. ## The last release is from January 2024, and master is two years past it The release history and the branch history have drifted apart, and the gap is large. The three most recent tags are v1.18.0 from May 2023, v1.19.0 from June 2023 and v1.20.0 from January 2024. The last push to the master branch was on 2026-09-14. So the tip of the default branch is roughly two and a half years beyond the newest tag, and there has been no release in that entire window. Given the four warnings at the top of the readme, this is consistent rather than alarming: work continued on master without anyone cutting a new version, which is exactly what a maintainer who has stopped releasing looks like. The consequence is practical for anyone installing it. You cannot point a package manager at a recent version, so you are choosing between an old tag that predates whatever you actually want and an untagged branch tip that carries no compatibility promise. Record the commit you install. ## Without the patched font the wizard keeps most prompt styles locked The getting-started sequence puts a font first and calls it optional, and then the configuration section contradicts that. The four steps are to install the recommended font, install the theme itself, restart the shell, and type the wizard command if it does not start on its own. The recommended font is a patched Meslo Nerd Font, and the readme is clear that installing it is highly recommended rather than optional. The reason appears in a tip attached to the wizard: install the recommended font before running the wizard to unlock all prompt styles. So the first step is not really optional, it is the thing that determines which styles the wizard will offer you. The consequence is that someone who skips the font and configures first gets a smaller set of choices, and may reasonably conclude that the theme lacks the styles the screenshots show. Fixing it means installing the font and running the wizard again. ## Pure style is only cosmetic, because Pure's variables are not read One compatibility mode is a genuine lookalike and another is not, and the readme draws the distinction without much fanfare. Powerlevel10k can produce the same prompt as the Pure theme, and you select it in the wizard, and you can still use the transient prompt and the instant prompt while wearing it. What you cannot do is configure it the way Pure is configured. The readme states plainly that Powerlevel10k does not recognise Pure configuration parameters, and gives the example that you need to use the Powerlevel9k-named threshold variable instead of Pure's own execution-time variable, and that all the relevant parameters are in the generated configuration file with comments. The consequence is a migration that looks complete in the prompt and is incomplete in the settings. Anyone carrying a tuned Pure setup across will find their values silently ignored, and the fix is to translate each one by hand rather than assume the names carried over. ## The default make target is empty and the minify target deletes your licence The Makefile has four targets and the first one does nothing at all, which is the first thing to know before you run make. What the interesting targets do is more surprising. The compilation target shells out to zsh, looks for zsh on the path, and loops over the theme files and the internal scripts, running zcompile with a flag that removes the source once the compiled version exists, so building strips the plain text out of the tree. The minify target is worse. After delegating to the gitstatus subdirectory it runs a recursive delete over the version control directory, the attributes and ignore files, the licence, the Makefile, the readme, the font documentation and the project image. ```make rm -rf -- .git .gitattributes .gitignore LICENSE Makefile README.md font.md powerlevel10k.png ``` The consequence is that a routine housekeeping command in an MIT-licensed project removes the licence and the readme from your working copy. That is fine if the artefact you are building carries them elsewhere, and it is not fine if you run it in a checkout and then lose the reference. ## Two themes and two setup directories sit in the tree for compatibility The compatibility claim is not just prose, it is visible in the file listing, and that is the strongest evidence in the repository. At the top level there are two theme files, one named for this project and one named for Powerlevel9k, its predecessor, and two setup directories to match, one for each. The readme backs this up by saying that Powerlevel10k understands all Powerlevel9k configuration parameters, that migration is straightforward, that existing parameters keep working, that the prompt will look the same as before, almost, and much faster, with the certainly in brackets doing a lot of work. The consequence is the pleasant one. Adopting this as a drop-in for Powerlevel9k is close to a file swap, and the generated configuration file carries comments through the whole option set, which is more than most themes offer. The caveat is the almost: the readme itself flags that identical configuration does not guarantee an identical prompt, so a careful migration is still a visual check. ## Three of the four headline indicators need other tools installed The performance claim is illustrated with a table of four commands and the indicator each one produces, and three of them only appear if you have installed something else. A clock glyph with a tag name appears when time tracking is enabled in timewarrior. A question mark followed by a count appears for untracked files in a git repository, and an exclamation mark followed by a count appears for unstaged changes. A snake glyph followed by a version string appears for the python version in pyenv. Only the git indicators are intrinsic to the shell. The consequence is that a reader evaluating the theme from a bare prompt will see one indicator out of four and may conclude the rest is broken, and the readme is candid about the surrounding behaviour anyway, saying other themes capable of the same information either produce prompt lag or print a prompt that does not reflect current state and refreshes later. The speed argument is about not lagging; the freshness argument is the one that needs your toolchain in place. ## Conclusion Adopt Powerlevel10k if you want the fastest-feeling prompt and already know how zsh themes work, because the compatibility work with two predecessors is genuinely thorough and the wizard writes a commented configuration file you can then edit by hand. Do not adopt it expecting an actively developed project: the readme says in four lines that no new features are in the works and that most bugs will go unfixed, and the last tag is over two years old. Three things to do first. Install the patched font before running the wizard, because prompt styles stay locked until you do. Pin a commit rather than tracking master, since there is no recent release to anchor to. And read the make targets before running any of them, because one of them removes the licence file from your working tree. ## FAQ ### What does Powerlevel10k do? It is a zsh theme that emphasises speed, flexibility and an out-of-the-box experience. It ships a configuration wizard that writes a commented configuration file, an instant prompt for slow shell startups, a transient prompt, and compatibility modes for the Powerlevel9k and Pure predecessors. ### How do I install Powerlevel10k? The getting-started sequence is to install the recommended patched font first, install the theme, restart the shell, then run the configuration wizard, by typing p10k configure, if it does not start on its own. The font is described as optional but highly recommended, and the readme says installing it before running the wizard unlocks all prompt styles. ### How do I run the Powerlevel10k configuration? Type p10k configure in the terminal to open the built-in wizard. It writes a configuration file at ~/.p10k.zsh based on your choices, and further customisation is done by editing that file directly, which the readme says is full of comments to help you navigate the options. ### Is Powerlevel10k still being developed? The readme says otherwise in four capitalised lines: the project has very limited support, no new features are in the works, most bugs will go unfixed and help requests will be ignored. The last tagged release is v1.20.0 from January 2024, while the last push to master was on 2026-09-14. ## Sources - [Official README](https://github.com/romkatv/powerlevel10k#readme) - [Project repository](https://github.com/romkatv/powerlevel10k) - [Release notes](https://github.com/romkatv/powerlevel10k/releases) --- Hysen Labs editorial analysis, written from the project's own repository and release notes. Cite the canonical page: https://hysenlabs.com/projects/romkatv-powerlevel10k