Can I use an external diff engine to compare files in bitbucket scm?

Question

The built-in diff engine in BitBucket is atrocious at aligning code in the side-by-side comparison.

If I add a function in say at line 124, pushing the existing function down 10 lines to line 134, BitBucket will align the existing function to the new function at 124, even though there is an exact match to the original function 10 lines lower.

It prefers matching:
    func GetConfigFileFromS3(key string) (*model.RevConfig, error) { 
to:
     func GetDefaultConfigFileFromS3(ItemName string) (*model.RevConfig, error) {

Its like it chooses a poor match here and can't even scan 10 lines further for an exact match.

Using BeyondCompare I can set the look ahead to 100s of lines so it will align properly even if I'm inserting large blocks of new code.

Andrew Newton_ynitbr · Answer

It's now the end of 2025 and I still cant use an external diff viewer that's actually good. I perpetually miss things as a result. Doesn't help that Git doesn't have any good GUIs for doing this either. Sourcetree is about the best but even that is... weak when compared to Surround SCM or even (until you need to work in a team), Subversion.

Robert Willard_1dito9 · Answer

Same question from me.  We're moving from an internal svn server to Bitbucket and git.  In svn I could connect beyondcompare as a diff viewer.  I prefer to use beyondcompare for all diff viewing.