Useful vim commands

This is a collection of command examples that are commonly used by instructors here at Lambda School.

This is not a complete reference or a tutorial. It is just the commands that we commonly use in order to edit quickly. See the links for more in-depth information.

[ESC] means to hit the escape key.
[RET] means to hit the return key.
CTRL-x means hold down control and x.

Editing

I: insert at the beginning of the line
A: append starting at end of line
D: delete to end of line
C: change from here to end of line
rX: replace the current character with character X
R: start replacing characters from the cursor on
~: change the case of a character
dd: delete (cut) the current line
dw: delete the current word
d$: delete from cursor to end of line
dtX: delete all characters up to the next occurrence of X in the line
dTX: delete all characters down to the previous occurrence of X in the line
ctX: change the characters from the cursor to the next occurrence of X in the line

Moving

h j k l: move the cursor left, down, up, and right faster than reaching for the arrow keys
$: move to end of line
^: move to the first non-space character in the line
0: move to the beginning of the line
tX: move to the next X character in the line
TX: move to just after the previous X character in the line
e: move to the end of the next (or current) word
b: move to the beginning of the previous (or current) word
w: move to the beginning of the next (or current) word
CTRL-f: move forward a page (page down)
CTRL-b: move backward a page (page up)
*: move to the next occurrence of the word under the cursor
#: move to the previous occurrence of a word under the cursor
%: move to the open/close brace/bracket/paren paired with the one under the cursor
/foo[RET]: search for the next occurrence of foo in the file
?foo[RET]: search for the previous occurrence of foo in the file
n: repeat the last search
N: repeat the last search, but in the other direction

Markers

ma: set marker a at the cursor location (can use any letter a-z)
`a: jump to marker a (can use any letter a-z)

Visual Blocks

v: start a cursor-oriented visual block
V: start a line-oriented visual block
CTRL-v: start a rectangular visual block

Once a block is selected:

c: change the block to different text (with rectangular blocks, this makes one cursor per line)
d: delete the block
y: yank (copy) the block
:s/foo/bar/g[RET]: replace all occurrences of foo with bar in the block (this will show up as :'<,'> when you first start typing)

Search and Replace

The following use regexes:

:s/foo/bar[RET]: replace the first occurrence of foo with bar on the current line
:s/foo/bar/g[RET]: replace all occurrences of foo with bar on the current line
:%s/foo/bar/g[RET]: replace all occurrence of foo with bar on all lines in the file

Cut/Copy/Paste

dd: delete (cut) the current line
dw: delete the current word
d$: delete from cursor to end of line
dtX: delete all characters up to the next occurrence of X in the line
dTX: delete all characters down to the previous occurrence of X in the line
x: delete the character under the cursor
yy: copy the current line
yw: copy the current word
y$: copy from cursor to end of line
p: paste after cursor position
P: paste before cursor position

GUI-based vims often support COMMAND-c/CTRL-c and COMMAND-v/CTRL-v for copying and pasting from the system buffer. (Note that the system copy/paste buffer is different from that used by the y and p commands.) If you're using the console-based vim, you might have to select the text to copy with the mouse if you want to copy it to the system copy/paste buffer.

Counting

20ix[ESC]: insert 20 x characters
15~: change the case of the next 15 characters
5k: move the cursor up 5 lines
12yy: copy 12 lines

Saving and Quitting

:q[RET]: quit unless the file has been modified
:q![RET]: quit even if the file has been modified, discarding changes
ZZ: save the file (only if it has been modified) and quit
:qa[RET]: quit all open tabs
:qa![RET]: quit all open tabs even if the files have been modified, discarding changes

Misc

.: repeat the last edit command, e.g. AHello[ESC]j. will add Hello to the end of the current and next line
xp: transpose the character under the cursor with the next one; not really a special command--simply x to cut the current character under the cursor followed by p to paste it after the cursor position
!!ls[RET]: run the ls command and insert its output into the document (can run any command)
:sh[RET]: spawn an interactive shell (hit CTRL-d or type exit[RET] to get back to vim)

Tabs

WIP
:q[RET]: close the current window or tab (if multiple windows or tabs are open)

Split Screen/Windows

WIP
:q[RET]: close the current window or tab (if multiple windows or tabs are open)

Macros

WIP

Home

Search

Provide feedback

Saved searches

Use saved searches to filter your results more quickly