Search Vim Tricks
Searching...<C-d> (in command mode)
Pressing in Vim's command line displays the full list of matching completions below the command prompt, without cycling through them one at a time.
command-line #command-line #completion #ex-commands #navigation
"Ay{motion}
Using an uppercase register letter with any operator appends to the register instead of replacing it.
zH and zL
zH and zL scroll the viewport horizontally by half a screen width, letting you navigate wide content efficiently when wrap is disabled.
navigation #navigation #scrolling #horizontal #nowrap #motions
:set debug=msg
When troubleshooting mappings or scripts that use :silent!, errors disappear without a trace.
:wincmd {key}
:wincmd is the Ex command equivalent of any keystroke.
:set scrolljump=5
When scrolloff is 0 and the cursor moves just past the screen boundary, Vim scrolls by exactly one line, which can feel abrupt during rapid navigation.
\@<= and \@<!
Vim's \@<= and \@<! atoms let you write zero-width lookbehind assertions — they check what comes before the match position without consuming characters.
z{N}<CR>
The z{N} command sets the current window's height to exactly N lines and simultaneously positions the current line at the top of the window.
z<CR> and zt
Both zt and z scroll the view so that the current line lands at the top of the screen, but they differ in one small but important way: z also moves the cursor t
vim.highlight.on_yank()
After yanking text in Vim it can be hard to tell exactly what was captured, especially with larger motions or text objects.
:s/\n/ /
One of the most confusing asymmetries in Vim's substitution syntax: \n and \r mean different things depending on whether they appear in the pattern or the repla
g- and g+
Vim's undo history is a tree, not a linear stack.
:earlier {N}m and :later {N}m
Vim's :earlier and :later commands let you travel through your edit history by wall-clock time rather than by individual undo steps.
:set cursorcolumn
:set cursorcolumn (or the short form set cuc) highlights the entire vertical column where the cursor sits, painting a visible strip from top to bottom of the wi
nzz
Typing nzz chains two normal-mode commands: n jumps to the next match of the last search, and zz immediately redraws the screen so the cursor line is vertically
<C-w>H and <C-w>K
After opening a split you can dynamically reposition windows using H, J, K, and L.
buffers-windows #windows #buffers-windows #navigation #normal-mode
:set gdefault
By default, :s/old/new/ only replaces the first occurrence of a pattern on each line.
zO and zC
zO and zC are the recursive counterparts to zo and zc.
:set formatoptions+=a
Vim's formatoptions setting controls how automatic text formatting works.
:e %:h/
Vim expands % to the current file's path in Ex commands, and the :h modifier strips the last filename component to give you just the directory.
