The Vim/Vi Editor Commands Cheat Sheet

A Vim or Vi editor cheat sheet, listing some useful, essential and most often used Vim commands for Linux users.

Cursor movement

• h – move left
• j – move down
• k – move up
• l – move right
• w – jump by start of words (punctuation considered words)
• W – jump by words (spaces separate words)
• e – jump to end of words (punctuation considered words)
• E – jump to end of words (no punctuation)
• b – jump backward by words (punctuation considered words)
• B – jump backward by words (no punctuation)
• 0 – (zero) start of line
• ^ – first non-blank character of line
• $ – end of line
• G – Go To command (prefix with number – 5G goes to line 5)

Note: Prefix a cursor movement command with a number to repeat it. For example, 4j moves down 4 lines.

Insert Mode – Inserting/Appending text

• i – start insert mode at cursor
• I – insert at the beginning of the line
• a – append after the cursor
• A – append at the end of the line
• o – open (append) blank line below current line (no need to press return)
• O – open blank line above current line
• ea – append at end of word
• Esc – exit insert mode

Editing

• r – replace a single character (does not use insert mode)
• J – join line below to the current one
• cc – change (replace) an entire line
• cw – change (replace) to the end of word
• c$ – change (replace) to the end of line
• s – delete character at cursor and subsitute text
• S – delete line at cursor and substitute text (same as cc)
• xp – transpose two letters (delete and paste, technically)
• u – undo
• . – repeat last command

Marking text (visual mode)

• v – start visual mode, mark lines, then do command (such as y-yank)
• V – start Linewise visual mode
• o – move to other end of marked area
• Ctrl+v – start visual block mode
• O – move to Other corner of block
• aw – mark a word
• ab – a () block (with braces)
• aB – a {} block (with brackets)
• ib – inner () block
• iB – inner {} block
• Esc – exit visual mode

Visual commands

• > – shift right
• < – shift left
• y – yank (copy) marked text
• d – delete marked text
• ~ – switch case

Cut and Paste

• yy – yank (copy) a line
• 2yy – yank 2 lines
• yw – yank word
• y$ – yank to end of line
• p – put (paste) the clipboard after cursor
• P – put (paste) before cursor
• dd – delete (cut) a line
• dw – delete (cut) the current word
• x – delete (cut) current character

Exiting

• :w – write (save) the file, but don’t exit
• :wq – write (save) and quit
• :q – quit (fails if anything has changed)
• :q! – quit and throw away changes

Search/Replace

• /pattern – search for pattern
• ?pattern – search backward for pattern
• n – repeat search in same direction
• N – repeat search in opposite direction
• :%s/old/new/g – replace all old with new throughout file
• :%s/old/new/gc – replace all old with new throughout file with confirmations

Working with multiple files

• :e filename – Edit a file in a new buffer
• :bnext (or :bn) – go to next buffer
• :bprev (of :bp) – go to previous buffer
• :bd – delete a buffer (close a file)
• :sp filename – Open a file in a new buffer and split window
• ctrl+ws – Split windows
• ctrl+ww – switch between windows
• ctrl+wq – Quit a window
• ctrl+wv – Split windows vertically