vim Command Examples

Vim (Vi IMproved), a command-line text editor, provides several modes for different kinds of text manipulation. Pressing i in normal mode enters insert mode. Pressing <Esc> goes back to normal mode, which enables the use of Vim commands. See also: vimdiff, vimtutor, nvim. More information: https://www.vim.org.

• Open a file:

vim {{path/to/file}}

• Open a file at a specified line number:

vim +{{line_number}} {{path/to/file}}

• View Vim's help manual:

:help<Enter>

• Save and quit the current buffer:

{{<Esc>ZZ|<Esc>:x<Enter>|<Esc>:wq<Enter>}}

• Enter normal mode and undo the last operation:

<Esc>u

• Search for a pattern in the file (press n/N to go to next/previous match):

/{{search_pattern}}<Enter>

• Perform a regular expression substitution in the whole file:

:%s/{{regular_expression}}/{{replacement}}/g<Enter>

• Display the line numbers:

:set nu<Enter>