Open files in VS Code and Cursor / Binary, network and hardware

Compare binary files in VS Code

VS Code's own diff only compares text. To compare two binary files, install the free Hex Viewer by Zovo, select both files in the Explorer, right-click and pick "Compare in Hex Viewer". The files show side by side in hex with one offset column, differing bytes are colored, and F7 jumps to the next difference. Two 4 GB files were compared in 2.1 s. Writing the list of differences to a CSV or JSON file is Zovo Pro.

Free, MIT license. Extension ID zovo.zovo-hex-viewer, version 0.3.7. Needs VS Code 1.90.0 or newer.

Steps in VS Code

1. Install Hex Viewer from the Marketplace, or press Ctrl+P (Cmd+P on macOS) and run ext install zovo.zovo-hex-viewer.
2. Select the two files in the Explorer (Ctrl+click or Cmd+click), right-click and pick "Compare in Hex Viewer".
3. Or open one file in Hex Viewer and click "Compare..." in the toolbar to pick the other one.
4. Press F7 for the next difference and Shift+F7 for the previous one. A run of differing bytes counts as one area.
5. Read the counts in the toolbar: every differing byte and every area. The scroll bar marks where they are.

Steps in Cursor, Windsurf or VSCodium

1. Open the Extensions view with Ctrl+Shift+X (Cmd+Shift+X on macOS).
2. Search for zovo.zovo-hex-viewer and click Install. Cursor, Windsurf and VSCodium install from Open VSX, where it is published as zovo/zovo-hex-viewer.
3. If your editor has no gallery, download the .vsix from the Open VSX page and run "Extensions: Install from VSIX...".
4. Then use it the same way as in VS Code.

What Hex Viewer handles

• Files of any size. The compare reads both files from disk, 1 MB at a time.
• Files of different length: bytes past the end of the shorter file count as different.
• The data inspector and Copy as work in the compare view, so you can read a changed value directly.
• Measured: two 4 GB files with one differing byte 64 bytes from the end were counted in 2.1 s on an Apple silicon Mac, with the extension host at 96 MB.

What it does not do

• It compares byte by byte at the same offsets. It does not align inserted or removed blocks the way a text diff does, so one inserted byte makes the rest of the file differ.
• It compares the files as saved on disk, not unsaved edits.
• The compare report (every differing range with offset, length and the first 16 bytes of both files, as text, CSV or JSON) is part of Zovo Pro, with 3 free tries.

Free and Zovo Pro

Free, and staying free: opening files of any size, go to offset, find with ?? wildcards, copy as C, Python or base64, the data inspector, editing with insert, delete and undo, safe save, and the side-by-side compare of two files.

Zovo Pro adds these tools to Hex Viewer. Each one works 3 times on your computer before it asks for a license. Nothing about Pro shows when you open a file: no popup, no countdown, no banner.

• The Structure view: 20 built-in binary templates (PNG, JPEG, GIF, BMP, TIFF, WebP, WAV, FLAC, MP4, ZIP, GZIP, TAR, PDF, SQLite, ELF, PE, Mach-O, Java class, PCAP and ICO), your own JSON templates, and export of a struct as JSON or as a C struct.
• Bookmarks with a name, a color and a note, saved per file, with Markdown export.
• Checksums of the selection or the whole file: CRC-32, Adler-32, MD5, SHA-1, SHA-256 and SHA-512.
• A compare report: every differing range written to a text, CSV or JSON file.
• Find bytes or text in many files at once.

Zovo Pro costs USD 19 once. It is not a subscription, and one purchase covers every Zovo VS Code extension. Today it also covers the Pro tools in Postgres & MySQL Query Client and DOCX Viewer, and Pro tools added to other Zovo extensions later.

Two ways to unlock it:

1. GitHub Sponsors: pick the "$19 one time" tier. Then, in VS Code, click a Pro tool and pick "Unlock with GitHub Sponsors" (or type "GitHub Sponsors" in the Command Palette) and sign in with the same GitHub account. A monthly sponsorship of USD 10 or more that is still running counts too.
2. PayPal, no GitHub account needed: send USD 19 by PayPal with "Zovo Pro" in the note, then post the transaction ID with the Zovo Pro key form (a public GitHub issue, so post only the ID). The license key goes to the email address of your PayPal account within a day. Click a Pro tool and pick "I have a license key" (or type "license key" in the Command Palette) and paste it. The key is checked on your computer, with no network call.

A team of 5: USD 59 once by PayPal, with "Zovo Pro Team" in the note. Every rule and every Pro tool is on the Zovo Pro page.

In JetBrains IDEs (IntelliJ IDEA, PyCharm, WebStorm, CLion and others)

• Built in: Compare Files. JetBrains IDEs compare two selected files with Ctrl+D (Cmd+D on macOS). For binary files they show only whether the files are equal.
• BinEd - Binary/Hex Editor. A binary and hex editor plugin with 500,280 downloads. Use "Open In / Binary Editor" in the project files menu.

Other options

• HexDiff (sj0000e.hexdiff, 21,918 installs, not on Open VSX). Its own description: "Compare two binary files in hexadecimal mode". Not on Open VSX.
• Hex Editor (Microsoft) (ms-vscode.hexeditor, 7.5 million installs, on Open VSX). Views and edits bytes. Its description does not list a two-file compare.
• cmp, fc /b or vbindiff. cmp -l a.bin b.bin on macOS and Linux lists every differing byte with its offset. On Windows, fc /b a.bin b.bin does the same. vbindiff shows two files side by side in a terminal.

Install counts and Open VSX status were checked on 9 November 2026. Descriptions in quotes are the extensions' own.

Questions

More about Hex Viewer

Read the Hex Viewer page for every feature and setting, or the source code on GitHub.

Related guides

• Hex Viewer & Binary Viewer on the VS Code Marketplace (also on Open VSX). Opens any file as hex, edits bytes and compares two files, even files of many GB.
• Use a hex editor in VS Code
• Open a binary file in VS Code
• Read binary files with templates in a VS Code hex editor
• A 010 Editor alternative inside VS Code