File explorer is one of the most widely-used types of plugin for Vim/Nvim. Below are my curated list of file explorers for Nvim. Some of these plugins are specifically written for Nvim and will not work for Vim.

nerdtree

  • vim or Neovim: both
  • platform: Windows, Linux, macOS
  • feature: rich feature with a lot of mappings
  • speed: slow for large directory

fern.vim

  • vim or nvim: both
  • platform: Windows, Linux, macOS
  • feature: rich feature
  • speed: implemented in vim script, asynchronous operation so maybe fast

vim-dirvish

  • vim or nvim: both
  • platform: Windows, Linux, macOS
  • feature: not very rich, concise without many decoration
  • speed:

nvim-tree.lua

  • vim or nvim: nvim only
  • platform: macOS, Linux, Windows
  • feature: seems complete
  • speed: quite fast, but for large number of files, there will be some delays.

tree.nvim

  • vim or nvim: nvim
  • platform: Linux, macOS (author claims to support Windows, but no install script available)
  • feature: medium feature
  • speed: haven’t tried, written in C++, maybe very fast

defx.nvim

  • vim or nvim: both
  • platform: Linux, macOS and Windows
  • feature: very rich
  • speed: haven’t tried, but may be fast due to python implementation.

chadTree

written in Python (requires at least Python 3.8.2)

  • vim or nvim: nvim only
  • platform: Linux, macOS and Windows
  • feature: very rich
  • speed: asynchronous and fast

lir.nvim

  • vim or nvim: nvim only (written in lua)

telescope-file-browser.nvim

  • vim or nvim: nvim only
  • platform: Linux, macOS and Windows
  • speed: asynchronous and fast (seems to be faster than nvim-tree.lua, I have tested both on a directory with 100000 files)
  • misc: It is an unconventional file explorer. It uses telescope floating window for file management.

Neo-tree.nvim

  • vim or nvim: nvim only
  • platform: Linux, macOS and Windows
  • feature: seems complete
  • speed: may be fast, haven’t tried.