Frontends

Frontends are programs that address a quality-of-life issue that emulators may not fulfill. For example, some emulator developers skip the user interface portion of development by having the user launch them from the command line. This usually means opening Command Prompt in the folder where the emulator is installed and typing something like emulator.exe game.rom. From a usability perspective, this is not optimal; running emulators from a shell can be considered tedious if commands aren't already scripted by the user (and they can't be expected to know how to set up such a thing if their first time loading the program is a black window that pops up and then disappears). To avoid this, many emulators will try to incorporate some kind of graphical user interface (GUI) in their standalone builds. For the emulators that never receive one however, a separate frontend project usually emerges.

Frontends have different Graphical User Interface (GUI) types. Some use the WIMP type, that uses Windows, Icons, Menus and a Pointer (like a mouse), examples of these interfaces are LaunchBox and OpenEmu. Others are intended for viewing on bigger screen (like a TV or arcade cabinet), and have navigation mostly optimized for game pads or joysticks (they usually also work with keyboards), these types of interfaces are here referred to as HTPC - RetroArch, HyperSpin and MAME's integrated frontend MEWUI are examples of this. There's also Touch interfaces which are intended for smartphones and tablet computers, mostly found in Android frontends.

Launcher types

These "Launchers" or "Executors" use their own graphical interface to start emulators. They're generally very adaptive and can support different arguments between emulators to ease integration. These frontends can be used with almost any emulator of your choosing, as long as they support command-line arguments.

Name	Platform(s)	Latest Version	Interface(s)	FOSS	Active	Recommended
PC / x86
LaunchBox		10.0	WIMP, HTPC	✗	✓	✓
Attract-Mode		2.6.1	HTPC	✓	✓	?
Nostlan		1.6.0	WIMP	✓	✓	?
Pegasus		Alpha 13	HTPC	✓	✓	?
RetroFE		0.9.0	HTPC	✓	✓	?
EmulationStation		2.0.1a	HTPC	✓	✗	?
HyperSpin		1.5.1	HTPC	✗	✗	?
Mobile / ARM
LaunchBox		0.33 ($)	Touch	✗	✓	✓
Attract-Mode		2.6.1	HTPC	✓	✓	?
Pegasus		Alpha 13	HTPC, Touch	✓	✓	?
EmulationStation		2.0.1a	HTPC	✓	?	?
HyperSpin		1.1	Touch	✗	✗	?

Comparisons

LaunchBox

Was originally built as an attractive front-end for DOSBox but has since expanded to support both modern PC games and emulated console platforms. It comes with an integrated metadata scraper, and the interface is highly customizable, likely the most customizable alongside HyperSpin, but only with a license for the premium version. Premium also includes Big Box, which is an HTPC version of the frontend. Launchbox can also be launched natively from Kodi.

Integrated emulator types

These "frontends" have a graphical user interface that lets you launch emulators that are included with the system, meaning it's not possible (or very difficult) to incorporate other emulators. They may or may not contain original emulator cores. If a program has mostly original cores, then it's called a multi-system emulator and is not included here.

Name	Platform(s)	Latest Version	Interface(s)	FOSS	Active	Recommended
PC / x86
OpenEmu		2.4.1	WIMP	✓	✓	✓
BizHawk		2.9.1	WIMP	~	✓	?
RetroPie		4.5.1	HTPC	✓	✓	?
Mobile / ARM
RetroPie		4.5.1	HTPC	✓	✓	✓

Comparisons

OpenEmu

A frontend for various emulators that runs under macOS.

Launcher mods

These programs aren't launchers themselves, but instead tools for changing other launchers.

Name	Platform(s)	Latest Version	FOSS	Active	Recommended
PC / x86
Steam ROM Manager		2.2.22	✓	✓	✓
Ice		1.0.0	✓	✗	✗

Comparisons

Steam ROM Manager

A tool that adds emulator launching capabilities to the Steam client.

Project-specific Frontends

Libretro

Name	Platform(s)	Latest Version	Core support	Interface(s)	FOSS	Active	Recommended
PC / x86
RetroArch		1.18.0	Full	HTPC, WIMP	✓	✓	✓
Ludo		0.10.4	Most non GL cores	HTPC	✓	✓	~
minir		Git	Limited	WIMP	~	✗	✗
Phoenix		0.0.1 (pre-alpha)	Limited	WIMP	✓	✗	✗
Mobile / ARM
RetroArch		1.18.0	Full	HTPC, Touch	✓	✓	✓
Blast16		1.0.18 (2020-01-18)	Genesis Plus GX, PicoDrive	HTPC	✗	✓	✓
SNESES		1.0.7 (2020-01-22)	Snes9X?	HTPC	✗	✓	✓
Ludo		0.10.4	Most non GL cores	HTPC	✓	✓	~
Lemuroid		1.0.0	Limited	Touch	✓	✓	?
Consoles
RetroArch		1.18.0	Full	HTPC	✓	✓	✓

Comparison

RetroArch

The flagship project for libretro, and the most widely available.

MAME

MAME was originally designed as a command line program. However, when the project relicensed as open source in February 2016, they merged the frontend MEWUI into the main project as part of the MAME executable. MEWUI uses the ten-foot interface philosophy which accounts for large television displays where the user is expected to use a TV remote-like input device to navigate the menus. However, MAME still supports command line arguments, so many old launchers still work with newer versions.

Name	Platform(s)	Latest Version	Interface(s)	FOSS	Active	Recommended
PC / x86
QMC2		0.195	HTPC	✓	✓	?
MAMEUI64		0.264	WIMP	✓	✓	?
Negatron		0.99.7	WIMP	✓	✓	?
Mobile / ARM

Mednafen

Mednafen is a command line program with no graphical interface whatsoever. These programs generally ease the process of launching games, but doesn't address things like controller configuration which is done by pressing hotkeys in-game.

Name	Platform(s)	Latest Version	Interface(s)	FOSS	Active	Recommended
PC / x86
Mednaffe		0.8.8	WIMP	✓	✓	✓
MedGui Reborn		0.110	WIMP	?	✓	?
MedLaunch		0.5.25.3	WIMP	✓	✗	?
MedGui		1.99999	WIMP	✓	✗	✗

Others

Name	Platform(s)	Latest Version	Emulator	Interface(s)	FOSS	Active	Recommended
PC / x86
Mupen64Plus-Qt		1.14	Mupen64Plus	WIMP	✓	✓	?
mupen64plus-gui / m64p		Git (frontend only) 2020-02-19 (m64p package)	Mupen64Plus	WIMP	?	✓	?
Sega Model 2 UI		WIP 2019-04-02	Model 2 Emulator	WIMP	?	✗	?
Sega Model 3 UI		WIP 2019-04-12	Supermodel	WIMP	?	✗	?
MedSat		1.8	Mednafen (Saturn core)	?	?	✗	?

See also

• Comparison of Emulator Frontends