Emacs
The best text editor in the world!
A very advanced and programmable IDE.
Hexstream's Common Lisp pitch thing
Why and how to get started with Common Lisp in 2025.
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I fairly quickly consolidated the following pitch from my initially completely manual, custom, one-on-one Common Lisp promotion efforts on LinkedIn.
I then proceeded to copy/paste it trillions of times, but of course this has always been just a temporary stopgap measure.
Now, I finally ported it to HTML for much better usability and shareability, so definitely use it and share it. :)
This article concisely consolidates a lot of important, up-to-date information in one place.
I recommend wide dissemination to help the Common Lisp community grow. Thank you!
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Please learn Common Lisp, the best programming language in the world!
Common Lisp is the best multi-paradigm general-purpose programming language out of the box, and can absorb almost any paradigm or feature as a library, and you can build up the language to represent any specialized domain exactly, resulting in vastly smaller codebases that are inherently much easier to maintain.
Common Lisp notably features CLOS/MOP, by far the best object-oriented system in the world, notably featuring Generic Functions, a complete game-changer!
Macros are of course legendary, allowing you to seamlessly integrate new constructs into the language, as if they had been built-in all along, using the full power of the language!
This is just a small glimpse at the huge palace of wonders you will discover if you learn Common Lisp!
I love Kent Pitman's famous quote:
Please don't assume Lisp is only useful for Animation and Graphics, AI, Bioinformatics, B2B and Ecommerce, Data Mining, EDA/Semiconductor applications, Expert Systems, Finance, Intelligent Agents, Knowledge Management, Mechanical CAD, Modeling and Simulation, Natural Language, Optimization, Research, Risk Analysis, Scheduling, Telecom, and Web Authoring just because these are the only things they happened to list.
Right now, the biggest Common Lisp success story is ITA Software which sold to Google for 700 million dollars in 2010.
I believe there will be even bigger Common Lisp success stories one day!
Please see the important information below to get started with Common Lisp, the best programming language in the world!
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Most Common Lispers today use the following stack and are very happy with it.
(Alternatives exist, but you don't need to think about them at first and can easily switch later anyway.)
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Practical Common Lisp
The most critically acclaimed Common Lisp book!
Common Lisp HyperSpec (CLHS)
To achieve the fastest and deepest possible mastery, take a deep dive into the CLHS, our "bible".
It is still our most important resource, despite the dated presentation. A better version is planned.
CLOS MOP
The most important de facto standard Common Lisp extension.
Epic FORMAT table!
Helping you tame the beast. :)
Notes and tips: Standard Common Lisp symbols
Groups related Common Lisp symbols in various ways.
Common Lisp cookbook
Tons of complementary explanations and examples.
Awesome Common Lisp
A curated list of awesome Common Lisp libraries.
CLiki
A huge repository of information about Common Lisp.
Current recommended libraries is an important page.
Common Lispers list
Discover Common Lisp Open Source contributors and their best contributions!
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Right now, the biggest Common Lisp success story is ITA Software which sold to Google for 700 million dollars in 2010.
I believe there will be even bigger Common Lisp success stories one day!
I think Kandria is worthy of a special mention. It's a complete game written entirely in Common Lisp, and open source to boot!
Here are a few collections of Common Lisp success stories:
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You may like to subscribe to the following to keep track of new developments in the Common Lisp world.
Planet Lisp
A very popular and fairly comprehensive Common Lisp blog aggregator.
/r/lisp
Popular reddit community about Common Lisp and other Lisps.
quicklisp-projects
Watch this repo for an almost complete set of new Common Lisp libraries.