Recently I encountered a quiz question about what a “command line web browser” for GNU/Linux was called. It was apparent that text mode was intended rather than command line – a command line program won’t actively use the whole screen, only the (current) command line itself. What caused more confusion, though, was that several of the answers were existing text mode browsers.

Both Lynx and Links were mentioned. The latter is about in at least two major flavors, ELinks and Links 2. The latter actually supports graphics more and even Javascript, but it’s lightweight enough that it long was my main browser (currently I tend to use Iceweasel, for convenience). The final text mode web browser that came to mind was w3m, which also bears the somewhat unusual distinction of supporting images inside a graphical terminal.