CKEditor

WYSIWYG rich text editor

CKEditor

Original author(s)| Frederico Caldeira Knabben
Developer(s)| CKSource
Stable release(s)

| CKEditor 4| 4.22.1[1] / June 30, 2023; 2 years ago (2023-06-30)[1]

|

CKEditor 4 LTS| 4.25.0-lts[1] / August 21, 2024; 11 months ago (2024-08-21)[1]
CKEditor 5| 44.3.0[2] / March 5, 2025; 4 months ago (2025-03-05)[2]

Repository| CKEditor 4 GitHub repo  CKEditor 5 GitHub repo
Written in| JavaScript
Type| HTML editor, online rich-text editor
License| CKEditor 4: GPL, LGPL and MPL[3]
CKEditor 4 LTS: commercial[3]
CKEditor 5: GPL and commercial[3]
Website| ckeditor.com

CKEditor (formerly known as FCKeditor) is a WYSIWYG rich text editor which enables writing content directly inside of web pages or online applications.[4][5][6][7] Its core code is written in JavaScript and it is developed by CKSource. CKEditor is available under open source and commercial licenses.[8]

## History

[edit]

### FCKeditor and CKEditor 3

[edit]

The first version of CKEditor, under the name FCKeditor, was released in March 2003 by Frederico Caldeira Knabben, the creator of the editor and the project's Benevolent Dictator for Life. After reaching more than 3 million downloads,[citation needed] FCKeditor was completely reviewed and redesigned into CKEditor 3, with special attention given to performance, accessibility and a new UI.[9]

### CKEditor 4

[edit]

In December 2012, CKEditor 4 was released with an Inline Editing solution, reformatted source code, enhanced DOM and CSS performance. The server-side implementations were removed. Retired in June 2023.[10]

### CKEditor 4 LTS

[edit]

A special commercial-only[3] continuance of CKEditor 4 only for security updates and critical bug fixes,[11] limited until December 2028.[12]

### CKEditor 5

[edit]

After five years, in 2018, CKEditor 5 first stable version was introduced. With its code rewritten from scratch, CKEditor 5 has a custom data model and architecture. The editor implements Operational Transformation for the tree-structured model as well as many other mechanisms which were required to create a real-time collaborative UX.[13]

CKEditor 5 is a JavaScript framework offering a rich API[14] to develop any editing solution. CKEditor 5 also offers builds, which are ready-to-use editors; there are currently 5 builds available to download: Classic, Inline, Balloon, Balloon block and Document.[15]

### CKEditor Ecosystem

[edit]

In October 2017, CKSource launched the CKEditor Ecosystem. As of 2023 it consists of the following products:

* CKEditor 5 Builds and CKEditor 5 Framework.
* CKBox, a standalone and integrated image upload and management service.
* CKEditor Cloud CDN, a cloud platform with editing features and (depending on version) real-time collaboration services. For free usage, it is unlimited only to CKEditor 4.[11]

## Features

[edit]

CKEditor 4 has features found in desktop word processors such as styles formatting (bold, italic, underline, bulleted and numbered lists), tables, block quoting, web resource linking, safe undo function, image inserting, paste from Word and other common HTML formatting tools. Also CKEditor 4 has built-in spell checker functionality provided as plug-ins by WebSpellChecker LLC. By default, it is available for free with a banner ad.[6] It checks the spelling of the text and marks all errors with a red wavy line and allows the user to choose one of the correct suggestions.

There are currently many plugins available with CKEditor 4 to serve different needs, e.g. CKFinder and Accessibility Checker (the CKSource's plugins). CKFinder is a file manager for including files and images within content created with the editors. It is compatible with both CKEditor 4 and 5 and is available under commercial license.

Accessibility Checker is available under both Open Source and commercial licenses.

### Real-time collaborative editing

[edit]

CKEditor 5's architecture and custom data model makes it possible to enable real-time collaborative editing.

A custom collaborative solution can be built by using the CKEditor 5 Framework components and real-time collaborative editing can be enabled by connecting to the CKEditor Cloud Services.

A ready to use, drop-in component based on CKEditor 5 (Letters) offers a complete solution for real-time collaborative writing.[16]

## Browser compatibility

[edit]

CKEditor 4 is fully compatible with most web browsers, including latest stable releases of Google Chrome, Firefox, Safari, Microsoft Edge, Opera and Internet Explorer 10 and 11.[17] In mobile environments, it has close to full support in Safari (iOS6 +) and Chrome (Android).[17]

CKEditor 5 is also compatible with Google Chrome, Firefox, Safari, Opera and Microsoft Edge. However, it does not support Internet Explorer 11 yet.[18]

## References

[edit]

1. ^ a b c d "CKEditor 4 - Download Latest Version". CKEditor.
2. ^ a b "Releases - ckeditor/ckeditor5". CKEditor - via GitHub.
3. ^ a b c d CKEditor licenses page
4. ^ Kumar, Neeraj; Koutlas, Tassos; Keen, Samuel; Crompton, Edward; Kanth, Krishna; James, Rakesh; Tewari, Malabya; Madel, Kurt (2016). Drupal 8 Development: Beginner's Guide. Packt Publishing Ltd. pp. 145–159\. ISBN 9781785286261. Retrieved 11 June 2019.
5. ^ Dombrowski, Quinn (2016). Drupal for Humanists. Texas A&M University Press. ISBN 9781623494735. Retrieved 11 June 2019.
6. ^ Jin, David; Lin, Sally (2011). Advances in Multimedia, Software Engineering and Computing Vol.1: Proceedings of the 2011 MESC International Conference on Multimedia, Software Engineering and Computing, November 26-27, Wuhan, China. Springer Science & Business Media. ISBN 9783642259890. Retrieved 11 June 2019.
7. ^ Byron, Angela; Berry, Addison; Robbins, Jeff; Haug, Nathan; Berry, Heather; Eaton, Jeff; Walker, James (2009). Using Drupal. "O'Reilly Media, Inc.". ISBN 9780596515805. Retrieved 11 June 2019.
8. ^ "CKEditor Pricing". CKEditor Official Page.
9. ^ "CKEditor 3.0 is here!". 2009-08-21. Retrieved 2020-03-20.
10. ^ "CKEditor 4 documentation infobox". Retrieved 19 October 2023.
11. ^ a b "CKEditor Cloud CDN". CKEditor. Retrieved 2025-01-16.
12. ^ "Keep CKEditor 4 safe and secure". CKEditor. Retrieved 2025-01-16.
13. ^ "CKEditor 5 v10.0.0 – the future of rich text editing looks stable". ckeditor.com. 26 April 2018. Retrieved 2018-05-07.
14. ^ "API documentation". Retrieved 4 August 2020.
15. ^ "CKEditor Ecosystem Documentation: Overview".
16. ^ "Bringing collaborative editing to any application". ckeditor.com. 31 October 2017. Retrieved 2017-11-23.
17. ^ a b "CKEditor Browser Compatibility". docs.cksource.com.
18. ^ "Browser compatibility". CKEditor 5 documentation. Retrieved 4 August 2020.

## External links

[edit]

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