In this blog post, we’ll walk through the best PuTTY configuration settings to enhance your terminal experience on Windows. These tweaks improve readability, usability, and overall comfort while working in the terminal.
1. Configure Window Size
Category ➜ Window
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Columns: 80
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Rows: 24
(These are the default values in Windows and work well for most situations. You can increase them based on your preference.)
2. Control the Scrollback Buffer
Window ➜ Lines of Scrollback
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Default: 2000
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Recommended: 5000 or higher if you often scroll through a lot of command history.
This setting controls how many lines of command output PuTTY retains in memory, allowing you to scroll up and view older output.
3. Customize Cursor Appearance
Window ➜ Appearance ➜ Click “Change…” under Cursor Appearance
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Options:
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Block (default)
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Underline
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Vertical line (my personal favorite for better visibility)
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Enable blinking cursor: Optional, based on personal preference.
4. Change Font for Better Readability
Window ➜ Appearance ➜ Click “Change…” under Font settings
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Default: Courier New, 10-point
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Recommended: Use your preferred font, at a minimum of 16-point for better clarity.
(Fonts like Consolas, Fira Code, or JetBrains Mono are great developer-friendly options.)
5. Adjust Window Border
Window ➜ Appearance
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Gap between text and window edge:
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Default: 1
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Recommended: Change to 2 for a bit more breathing room between the text and window border.
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6. Enable Copy-Paste with Right-Click
Window ➜ Selection
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Check the option: “Paste to clipboard in RTF as well as plain text”
This enables easier and more flexible copy-paste functionality using the right-click.
7. Set Terminal to Use UTF-8 Encoding
Window ➜ Translation
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Character set translation: Set to UTF-8
This ensures better compatibility with special characters, emojis, and non-English scripts.
8. Save Your Settings as Default
Once you’ve made all the desired changes:
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Go to the Session category (top of the left-hand list).
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Under Saved Sessions, click on Default Settings.
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Click Save.
This ensures all your customizations are saved and automatically applied every time you launch PuTTY.
By applying these configurations, your PuTTY session will not only look cleaner but also function more efficiently for daily use. These are the settings I personally use and recommend for both beginner and advanced users.
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