Flea

The fastest GUI file manager on Linux.
Keyboard-first. Built for Omarchy.

Install · Views · Performance · Keyboard · Releases

Flea combines a Rust backend with a Quickshell interface that follows your Omarchy theme. Large directories stay responsive: the window loads rows and requests thumbnails as you need them.

• Three views. List, columns and grid, with tabs and natural filename sorting.
• Quick Look. Press Space for images, PDFs, text, media and archive contents.
• File operations. Copy, move, rename, trash, compress and extract, with an undo journal.
• Network and sharing. SMB, SFTP, FTPS, WebDAV, NFS, Dropbox and Taildrop.
• Devices. USB drives, phones and cameras over MTP, PTP and AFC, mounted from the rail.
• Desktop integration. Default file manager, “Show in folder” and Open/Save dialogs.
• Your settings. Omarchy text sizes, configurable menus and Default, Vim, Mac or Windows keys.

An iPhone lists once it has been unlocked and trusted on this machine: AFC needs the pairing record that leaves behind, not an unlocked screen every time. Pairing also puts the phone on its tethering USB configuration, so iOS shows Personal Hotspot as active while it is plugged in, and Flea never uses it. If this machine should never route through the phone, tell NetworkManager so with a conf.d drop-in carrying unmanaged-devices=driver:ipheth; that is your call, not the package's.

Install

omarchy pkg add flea

Make Flea your default file manager, file chooser and the app opened by Super+Shift+F:

flea --default
systemctl --user restart xdg-desktop-portal

Update through Omarchy:

omarchy update

File chooser only, development package and removal

Use Flea for portal Open/Save dialogs without changing your default file manager:

flea --picker
systemctl --user restart xdg-desktop-portal

For the rolling development build:

omarchy pkg aur add flea-git

Before removing Flea, undo its desktop integration:

flea --default off
omarchy pkg drop flea

If you previously pinned another directory handler, restore that handler explicitly. Installation details cover dependencies, desktop integration and removal.

Views

List for file details. Grid for photos and clips. Columns for browsing folders with a preview beside them.

Space opens Quick Look from any view. Page through a PDF, play media or inspect an archive.

The shelf lives in the Omarchy bar: send files there from any menu, drag them out into any app, pin the ones you keep coming back to. Phones are Devices rows over MTP, AFC and PTP.

Performance

Measured on 22 September 2026, using the 0.3.2 source tree. Cold caches, three runs per app, medians below. Seven GUI apps on the same Omarchy machine.

Flea's memory does not grow with the directory: first at 100,000 entries, mid-field at 2,000. At 100,000 files Flea's window used 70.5 MiB against Strata's 107.9 MiB, the next lightest; on 2,000 media files it used 83.4 MiB, fifth of seven.

100,000 files

Flea led every column of this run.

File manager	First window	Settled	Window PSS	CPU
Flea	277 ms	1.13 s	70.5 MiB	0.73 s
Strata	576 ms	3.23 s	107.9 MiB	3.15 s
Dolphin	715 ms	5.26 s	198.6 MiB	9.18 s
Nemo	792 ms	22.60 s	459.8 MiB	26.01 s
Thunar	561 ms	23.06 s	346.3 MiB	22.88 s
PCManFM	449 ms	36.13 s	109.9 MiB	25.01 s
Nautilus	869 ms	83.80 s	333.6 MiB	18.80 s

2,000 mixed files

The apps produced different amounts of thumbnail work, so settled time and CPU are not ranked across the whole table. Flea and Strata made the same work, 43 and 42 thumbnails, and Flea settled in 1.92 s against 2.87 s on less CPU.

File manager	First window	Settled	Window PSS	CPU	Thumbnails
Flea	296 ms	1.92 s	83.4 MiB	6.02 s	43
Dolphin	724 ms	13.71 s	92.2 MiB	66.70 s	500
Nautilus	856 ms	19.85 s	180.4 MiB	122.70 s	641
Nemo	855 ms	3.45 s	54.8 MiB	8.97 s	60
PCManFM	421 ms	Timed out	39.6 MiB	158.35 s	690
Strata	557 ms	2.87 s	73.8 MiB	7.13 s	42
Thunar	536 ms	12.81 s	38.8 MiB	20.58 s	221

1,700 matched files

The same set less HEIC and MKV, the two formats some of these apps decline, so none of them finishes sooner by skipping a format. Work still differs by app, so the same rule holds. Nemo left nothing in the thumbnail cache on this set, so its work was not measured and its time is not a result. Flea and Strata again made the same work, and Flea settled in 1.93 s against 2.93 s. One of Flea's three runs mapped in 3.7 s, and three more, Flea alone, mapped in 267 to 329 ms.

File manager	First window	Settled	Window PSS	CPU	Thumbnails
Flea	296 ms	1.93 s	82.0 MiB	6.39 s	43
Dolphin	695 ms	14.18 s	92.9 MiB	65.20 s	500
Nautilus	945 ms	18.88 s	179.8 MiB	115.52 s	641
Nemo	814 ms	1.74 s	46.4 MiB	1.58 s	not measured
PCManFM	421 ms	113.50 s	41.5 MiB	178.95 s	700
Strata	570 ms	2.93 s	74.1 MiB	7.15 s	42
Thunar	551 ms	13.25 s	40.5 MiB	20.79 s	221

"First window" records compositor registration. "Settled" means 500 ms without process-tree CPU activity; neither measures input readiness. PSS covers the window process, excluding helpers and GPU memory. Flea's separate backend used a median 6.4 MiB on the large listing and 3.1 MiB on media. CPU is everything the app started, counted from a control group of its own, so sandboxed thumbnailers are in it; a figure from before 0.3.2 counted only reaped children and is not comparable. Shared libraries affect PSS. PCManFM did not settle in any media run. Results describe this machine and workload.

Method · Scale CSV · Scale manifest · Media CSV · Media manifest · Matched CSV · Matched manifest · 0.1.6 run and TUI results

Keyboard

Press ? for the full keymap, or , to change settings.

Action	Keys
Move / parent / enter	j k / h / l
Open with the default app	Enter
Quick Look	Space
Select / extend selection	v / Shift + arrows
Copy / cut / paste	y x p, or Ctrl+C Ctrl+X Ctrl+V
Rename / trash / undo	r or F2 / dd or Delete / z
New folder	Ctrl+Shift+N
Search / filter the list	f / /
Enter a path	: or Ctrl+L
List / columns / grid	Ctrl+1 / Ctrl+2 / Ctrl+3
New tab / close tab / switch tab	t / w / 1–9
Open terminal / context menu	Ctrl+T / m
Show hidden files	.

The Windows preset uses Ctrl+Shift+1/2/3 for views. Menu visibility does not disable shortcuts. See the full key table for preset bindings and pointer actions.

Build

Requires Omarchy, Quickshell 0.3.1 or newer, and Rust. See installation details for runtime and optional dependencies.

cargo build --release
FLEA_UI="$PWD/ui" ./target/release/flea --gui

Pass a directory to open it, or --select <path> to reveal a file. The terminal interface is not implemented yet.

./tests/run-all.sh

The headless runner builds both profiles and reports suites that need a display, credentials or a package. The test suites cover file operations, previews, persistence and input; the protocol guide documents the backend.

Support

If this saved you an afternoon, you can sponsor me on GitHub or buy me a coffee.

Licence

MIT.