Show Menu
Cheatography
  1. Home >
  2. Software >

Vim Cheat sheet Keyboard Shortcuts (DRAFT) by

Vim Cheat sheet with commands and shortcuts

This is a draft cheat sheet. It is a work in progress and is not finished yet.

File Commands

:e filename
open a file in vim
 
:E
open a file explorer window
 
:wq
save changes in the current file and quit
 
:w filename
save changes in the current file or in the new file if filename was provided
 
:saveas filename
save changes in the new file
 
:q
quit Vim
 
:q!
quit Vim without saving changes

Navigation

h
move left
 
j
move down
 
k
move up
 
l
move right
 
w
move to the start of the next word
 
gg
go to the start of a file
 
G
go to the end of a file
 
50G
jump to the line 50
 
:50
jump to the line 50

Edit mode

i
enter insert mode at cursor
 
I
enter insert mode at the start of the line
 
a
enter append mode after cursor
 
A
enter append mode at the end of the line

Deleting Text

x
delete character
 
dd
delete line
 
D
delete to end of line
 
daw
delete a word (regar­dless of cursor position within that word)
 
das
delete entire sentence (ending with a . / ? / !)
 
dap
delete entire paragraph
 
dat
delete a tag (while cursor position is on that tag)
 
da}
or 
di}
delete section between curly braces (while cursor position is within them)

Undo & Redo

u
undo
 
CTRL+r
redo

Copying and Pasting

yy
yank/copy line
 
yaw
yank/copy a word
 
p
paste after cursor
 
P
paste before cursor
 

Find & Replace

/
start pattern serach
 
n
repeat search in the same direction
 
N
repeat search in the opposite direction
 
f<C­HAR­ACT­ER>
find character forward
 
F<C­HAR­ACT­ER>
find character backward
 
:s/foo­/bar/g
replace all 'foo' with 'bar' in the current line
 
:%s/fo­o/bar/g
replace all 'foo' with 'bar' in the whole document
 
:retab
replace tab with spaces

Macros

qa
start recording a macro in the 
a
registry
 
q
stop recording a macro
 
@a
replay a macro stored in 
a
registry
 
:reg a
look at the contents of a registry
 
0
as a first step of the macro to start on the beginning of the line
 
j
used at the end of macro to move the cursor to the next line, so that it would be easy to repeat a macro
 
:20,100 normal @a
apply a macro from an 
a
registry for the lines in range 20 - 100

Windows and Files

:split
or 
:sp
split the window horizo­ntally
 
:vsplit
or 
:vs
split the window vertically
 
CTRL + w
navigate between split windows (can be followed with a motion key)
 
:bn
go to the next file
 
:bp
go to the previous file
 
:bd
close the current file

Text alignment

:center
center text (can be selected in visual mode) to the width of 80
 
:left
left align
 
:left 5
left align text with 5 spaces indent­ation
 
:right
right align text to the width 80

Visual mode

v
start visual mode
 
V
start linewise visual mode
 
CTRL + v
start visual block mode (column edit)
 
gv
reselect the same bit of text
 
V
, select, 
J
start linewise visual mode, select few lines and join them into a single line with 
J
 
~
switch case
 
c
change text
 
d
delete text
 
y
yank
 
r
replace text
 
x
delete
 
I
insert
 
A
append
 
J
join
 
U
make uppercase
 
u
make lowercase
 
>
shift right
 
<
shift left