https://www.pistack.xyz/tags/syntax-highlighting/ Recent content in Syntax-Highlighting on Pi Stack Hugo en-us Wed, 12 Aug 2026 00:00:00 +0000 https://www.pistack.xyz/posts/2026-08-12-highlightjs-vs-prism-vs-shiki-syntax-highlighting-comparison/ Wed, 12 Aug 2026 00:00:00 +0000 https://www.pistack.xyz/posts/2026-08-12-highlightjs-vs-prism-vs-shiki-syntax-highlighting-comparison/ <p>Your documentation site renders code blocks that look like 2012. The problem: syntax highlighting on the modern web is a fork in the road with three very different destinations. <strong>highlight.js (24,981 stars)</strong> is the zero-config veteran that auto-detects 190+ languages and works with zero build setup. <strong>Prism (13,035 stars)</strong> is the lightweight, plugin-extensible classic built for hand-rolled pages and static sites. <strong>Shiki (13,695 stars)</strong> is the newcomer that reuses VS Code&rsquo;s TextMate grammar engine to produce pixel-identical highlighting — but it renders on the server, async, and demands a modern build pipeline. Pick the wrong one and you either ship 400 kB of unused language grammars to every visitor, or you spend a weekend fighting a build integration that was never designed for your static site generator.</p>