Ultimate Vim Cheat Sheet: Learn to Use Vim Like a Pro

A Quick Intro to Vim

Vi is a modal text editor first released in 1976 for Unix systems. Vim, (Vi Improved) Vi’s successor, was first released in 1991. Despite its very old age, Vim is extremely popular among web developers and system administrators, as it is installed by default on all Unix-based systems (Mac OS and Linux distros). Unlike classic text editors, Vim features different modes used for different operations. Vim has a total of 12 modes, although you will mostly use the following:

• Insert Mode: This mode is used to insert text by typing, like you would do on any other text editor. To enter insert mode, type i while in command mode.
• Command Mode: Also named Normal Mode, this mode is used to type Vim commands such as those you’ll find in our Vim Cheat Sheet. To exit insert mode and enter command mode, hit the Esc key of your keyboard.
• Visual Mode: Similar to command mode, but used to highlight areas of text. Normal commands are run on the highlighted area, which, for instance, can be used to move or edit a selection. Press the v key to start visual mode. To exit visual mode, press the Esc key.

Basics

Let’s start with basic commands that will allow you to write, save and quit files. Remember that these Vim commands need to be typed while in command or visual mode. Exit insert mode by hitting the Esc key, then type the command of your choice.

:e filename	Open filename for edition
:w	Save file
:q	Exit Vim
:q!	Quit without saving current file
:x	Write/Save file (if changes has been made) and exit
:sav filename	Save current file as filename
.	Repeat the last change made in normal mode
5.	Repeat 5 times the last change made in normal mode

Moving In The File

Vim features powerful commands that allow you to easily move the cursor position to any desired location within the current file, making it quick and easy to insert text.

k or Up Arrow	move cursor up one line
j or Down Arrow	move cursor down one line
e	move cursor to the end of the word
b	move the cursor to the beginning of the word
0	move the cursor to the first non-blank character of the line
G	move the cursor to the end of the file
gg	move the cursor position to the beginning of the file
L	move the cursor to the bottom of the screen
:59	move cursor to line 59. Replace 59 by the desired line number.
%	Move cursor to matching parenthesis
[[	Jump to function start
[{	Jump to block start

Cut, Copy & Paste

Vim features powerful functions to cut, copy, and paste. This section of our Vim Cheat Sheet will show you how to easily perform those operations. Please note that y stands for yank in Vim, which in other editors is usually called copy.

y	Yank/Copy the selected text to clipboard
p	Paste clipboard contents
dd	Cut current line
yw	Yank/Copy word
yy	Yank/Copy current line
y$	Yank/Copy to end of line
D	Cut to end of line

Search

Searching a string within a huge file or multiple files can be tricky. Thanks to Vim, using a few commands you can easily find whatever you’re looking for.

/word	Search word from top to bottom
?word	Search word from bottom to top
*	Search the word under cursor
/\cstring	Search STRING or string, case insensitive
/jo[ha]n	Search john or joan
/\< the	Search the, theatre or then
/the\>	Search the or breathe
/\< the\>	Search the
/\< ¦.\>	Search all words consisting of 4 letters
/\/	Search fred but not alfred or frederick
/fred\|joe	Search fred or joe
/\<\d\d\d\d\>	Search exactly 4 digits
/^\n\{3}	Find 3 empty lines
:bufdo /searchstr/	Search in multiple files
bufdo %s/something/somethingelse/g	Search something in all the open buffers and replace it with somethingelse

Replace

Similar to Search, Vim features powerful commands to replace any given text. This part of our cheat sheet contains Vim commands for replacing any portion of text with another.

:%s/old/new/g	Replace all occurences of old with new in file
:%s/onward/forward/gi	Replace onward with forward, case insensitive
:%s/old/new/gc	Replace all occurences with confirmation
:2,35s/old/new/g	Replace all occurences between lines 2 and 35
:5,$s/old/new/g	Replace all occurences from line 5 to EOF
:%s/^/hello/g	Replace the beginning of each line by hello
:%s/$/Harry/g	Replace the end of each line by Harry
:%s/onward/forward/gi	Replace onward with forward, case insensitive
x	Delete character
:%s/ *$//g	Delete all white spaces and keep any non-blank character
:g/string/d	Delete all lines containing string
:v/string/d	Delete all lines not containing string
:s/Bill/Steve/	Replace the first occurrence of Bill with Steve in current line
:s/Bill/Steve/g	Replace Bill with Steve in current line
:%s/Bill/Steve/g	Replace Bill with Steve in all of the file
:%s/^M//g	Delete DOS carriage returns (^M)
:%s/\r/\r/g	Transform DOS carriage returns in returns
:%s#<[^>]\+>##g	Delete HTML tags but keep text
:%s/^\(.*\)\n\1$/\1/	Delete lines that appear twice
Ctrl+a	Increment number under the cursor
Ctrl+x	Decrement number under cursor
ggVGg?	Change text to Rot13

Case

Vim provides very interesting commands to deal with case. Let’s continue to explore our Vim Cheat Sheet with super useful case-related commands.

Vu	Lowercase line
VU	Uppercase line
g~~	Invert case
vEU	Switch word to uppercase
vE~	Modify word case
ggguG	Set all text to lowercase
gggUG	Set all text to uppercase
:set ignorecase	Ignore case in searches
:set smartcase	Ignore case in searches except if an uppercase letter is used
:%s/\<./\u&/g	Sets the first letter of each word to uppercase
:%s/\<./\l&/g	Sets the first non-blank character of each word to lowercase
:%s/.*/\u&	Sets the first character of the line to uppercase
:%s/.*/\l&	Sets the first character of the line to lowercase

Read and Write Files

Vim allows easy manipulation of files. Listed below are a few examples of file manipulation with Vim.

:1,10 w outfile	Save lines 1 to 10 in outfile
:1,10 w >> outfile	Append lines 1 to 10 to outfile
:r infile	Insert the content of infile
:23r infile	Insert the content of infile under line 23

File Explorer

Vim features a built-in file explorer that allows its users to quickly visualize and open files in the editor.

:e .	Open integrated file explorer
:Sex	Split window and open integrated file explorer
:Sex!	Same as :Sex but splits window vertically
:browse e	Graphical file explorer
:ls	List buffers
:cd ..	Move to parent directory
:args	List files
:args *.php	Open file list
:grep expression *.php	Return a list of .php files contening expression
gf	Open file name under cursor

Interacting With Unix

As Vi and Vim were initially built for Unix systems, the text editor can interact with the OS.

:!pwd	Execute the pwd Unix command, then return to Vi
!!pwd	Execute the pwd unix command and insert output in file
:sh	Temporary return to Unix
$exit	Return to Vi

Alignment

Using Vim, it’s possible to automatically align lines using a few simple commands. Here are the main important ones:

:%!fmt	Align all lines
!}fmt	Align all lines at the current position
5!!fmt	Align the next 5 lines

Tabs and Windows

Vim can use various tabs and windows, which is very useful for working with many files at once.

:tabnew	Create/Open a new tab
gt	Show next tab
:tabfirst	Show first tab
:tablast	Show last tab
:tabm n(position)	Rearrange tabs
:tabdo %s/foo/bar/g	Execute a command in all tabs
:tab ball	Puts all open files in tabs (Each in a new tab)
:new abc.txt	Edit abc.txt in new window

Window Spliting

As a web developer, I always like to split my Vim editor in two parts, one for my HTML and one for my CSS stylesheet. This part of our Vim Cheat Sheet describes how to split the main editor window.

:e filename	Edit filename in current window
:split filename	Split the window and open filename
ctrl-w up arrow	Put cursor in top window
ctrl-w ctrl-w	Put cursor in next window
ctrl-w_	Maximize current window vertically
ctrl-w|	Maximize current window horizontally
ctrl-w=	Gives the same size to all windows
10 ctrl-w+	Add 10 lines to current window
:vsplit file	Split window vertically
:sview file	Same as :split in Read Only Mode
:hide	Close current window
:­nly	Close all windows, except current
:b 2	Open #2 in this window

Auto Completion

Like much more modern editors, Vim can auto-complete your code and use dictionaries.

Ctrl+N Ctrl+P (in insert mode)	Complete word
Ctrl+x Ctrl+l	Complete line
:set dictionary=dict	Define dict as a dictionary
Ctrl+x Ctrl+k	Complete with dictionary

Markers

Vim allows its users to set marks at a position of their choice, so they can easily jump back to that predefined position. A must when working with large files.

m {a-z}	Marks current position as {a-z}
‘ {a-z}	Move to position {a-z}
”	Move to previous position

Abbreviations

Another handy Vim function is the possibility to define abbreviations.

:ab mail mail@provider.org

Define mail as abbreviation of mail@provider.org

Text Indent

Indentation is the key to readable and easy-to-maintain code. Vim possesses a few commands that will come in handy for indenting any file.

:set autoindent	Turn on auto-indent
:set smartindent	Turn on intelligent auto-indent
:set shiftwidth=4	Define 4 spaces as indent size
ctrl-t, ctrl-d	Indent/un-indent in insert mode
>>	Indent
<<	Un-indent
=%	Indent the code between parenthesis
1GVG=	Indent the whole file

Syntax Highlighting

Syntax highlighting is often very useful for preventing coding mistakes and typos. Vim can work with many different syntax highlighting modes, depending on which programming language you are coding with.

:syntax on	Turn on syntax highlighting
:syntax off	Turn off syntax highlighting
:set syntax=perl	Force syntax highlighting