What is Eternal Terminal (eternalterminal.dev)?

Updated

Eternal Terminal (ET) is a remote shell that automatically reconnects without interrupting the session. It is designed for people who work over connections that drop or change — Wi-Fi handoffs, laptop sleep, VPN hiccups, or IP roaming — and who don't want to lose their running work when that happens. If your main pain point is "my SSH session dies and I have to start over," ET is built for exactly that case.

The core idea

ET keeps your session alive across network outages and IP changes. With a normal ssh connection, a network drop kills the session; you have to reconnect and rebuild your state. ET instead maintains the session so it resumes quickly once connectivity returns.

It still uses ssh to initialize the connection — the difference is what happens after. The session survives conditions that would terminate a plain SSH session.

How it differs from the alternatives

ET's own documentation frames it against three related tools, which is the clearest way to see where it fits:

| Tool | Reconnects? | Keeps the same session? | Notes | |---|---|---|---|---| | ssh | No | No | Great remote terminal; ET uses it to initialize the connection. A network outage means killing and reconnecting. | | autossh | Yes | No | Restarts the SSH session on reconnect, so each reconnect starts a new session. | | mosh | Yes | Yes (core functionality) | Popular alternative; does not support native scrolling or tmux control mode (tmux -CC). | | Eternal Terminal | Yes | Yes | Survives network outages and IP roaming; supports native scrolling and tmux control mode. |

The practical distinction from autossh: even though it reconnects automatically, it starts a new session each time. If you use tmux with control mode, you'd have to wait for the SSH connection to die and then re-attach. ET maintains your tmux session even when the TCP connection dies, so it resumes quickly instead of forcing that re-attach cycle.

The distinction from mosh: same core reconnection behavior, but ET supports native scrolling and tmux control mode (tmux -CC), which mosh does not.

When ET is the right choice

Choose ET if:

  • Your connection is unreliable or changes networks (mobile, travel, flaky Wi-Fi).
  • You rely on tmux control mode (tmux -CC) and want it to survive drops.
  • You want native scrolling in your terminal.
  • You want reconnection that preserves the session rather than starting a fresh one.

Consider something else if:

  • You only ever connect over stable networks and never lose sessions — plain ssh is simpler.
  • You specifically need mosh's behavior and don't care about native scrolling or tmux -CC.

Getting started

The project provides a Download page, a Tutorial, and a How it Works page on eternalterminal.dev. Start with the Tutorial for installation and usage steps, and use How it Works if you want to understand the reconnection mechanism before deploying it.

ET is authored by Jason Gauci (site footer credits "Jason Gauci • 2026").