A Quantitative and Qualitative Analysis of Popular Integrated Development Environments for Frontend Development

This paper presents a comprehensive analysis of popular integrated development environments (IDEs) used in front-end development. Focusing on both market usage data and qualitative comparisons of key feature sets, we examine Visual Studio Code, WebStorm, Sublime Text, IntelliJ IDEA, Zed, Eclipse Theia, and Visual Studio Community edition. We discuss adoption trends, core strengths, and usability aspects—including ease of configuring extensions and plugins—while also reporting approximated performance and startup measurements seen on our test system. This paper offers practical guidance for developers and organizations in selecting an IDE that best fits their workflow and project needs.