Canopy is a lightweight, privacy-first Python IDE built for developers who want a fast, clean editing experience without telemetry, forced AI features, or extension bloat.
I spent years writing Python in VS Code. At first it felt fine - until it didn't.
The IDE started phoning home. Copilot got bolted on everywhere whether I wanted it or not. Pyright was the only real LSP option - it is painfully slow for large projects, and it is baked in so tightly that swapping it out was a fight. And the whole thing kept getting heavier - more telemetry, more nag screens, more things I didn't ask for and couldn't turn off.
I wanted a Python IDE that was small, private, fast, and honest about what it is. So I built Canopy.
It's opinionated by design. It won't try to sell you AI features, it won't report your keystrokes anywhere, and it won't bloat itself with an extension ecosystem. It's just a clean, fast editor for people who write Python and want to stay in flow.
| Feature | Description |
|---|---|
| Monaco Editor | Full IntelliSense-grade editing experience |
| Dual LSP support | basedpyright or ty, switchable at runtime |
| Auto venv detection | Finds .venv, venv, .env automatically |
Native uv support |
First-class environment manager integration |
| Zero telemetry | No analytics, no crash reporters, no phone home |
Canopy ships as a lean package. There's no extension marketplace, no plugin runtime overhead, no background update daemons. The build pipeline aggressively strips source maps, test files, and type declarations from the bundle. It loads fast and stays fast - thanks in part to SvelteKit, but also due to the opinionated philosophy.
No analytics. No crash reporters phoning home. No event tracking. The only network traffic Canopy generates is the traffic you initiate - running your code, fetching packages.
Canopy was built for one language and it shows. Virtual environment detection is automatic — drop a .venv in your project and Canopy picks it up, reads pyvenv.cfg, and configures the language server without asking. It watches for new environments appearing mid-session. pyproject.toml is a first-class citizen.
Dark mode. Clean layout. The interface has a file tree, an editor, a terminal, a status bar, and nothing else fighting for your attention.
Canopy auto-detects uv and integrates it natively for environment and dependency management - no configuration needed. For type checking, you can choose between basedpyright (battle-tested) and ty (Astral's blazing-fast new type checker, which also exposes an LSP server). Switch between them in one click. Both are supported as first-class LSP adapters with full semantic highlighting, diagnostics, hover types, completions, and go-to-definition.
One of my main gripes with VSCode came after I found out about the amount of bloat it includes in the system instructions for both Copilot and Claude Code. For this reason, Canopy doesn't bundle Copilot or any other AI features, nor does it nudge you toward any AI assistant. If you want AI help, you already know where to find it: open the built-in terminal and run Claude Code, Gemini CLI, OpenCode, or whatever you prefer. Your editor and your AI workflow stay decoupled — the way they should be.
Command palette: find in file, open by name, toggle panels — keyboard-driven
Project-wide diagnostics from ty or basedpyright, all in one place
Grab the latest release for your platform from the Releases page.
Agentic development features — deeper integration with AI coding workflows, directly inside the IDE. Designed the right way: opt-in, composable, and without lock-in.
- Electron — desktop runtime
- Svelte 5 + SvelteKit — UI framework
- Monaco Editor — code editing engine
PolyForm Perimeter 1.0.0 © Rafael Pierre