How do I center text on the current line using a built-in Vim command?

Explanation

Vim has three built-in ex commands for text alignment that most users never discover: :ce (center), :ri (right-justify), and :le (left-justify). These commands work directly on lines without any plugin and accept an optional column-width argument.

How it works

• :ce [width] — centers the current line within width columns. Defaults to textwidth if set, otherwise 80.
• :ri [width] — right-justifies the current line, padding with spaces on the left.
• :le [indent] — left-justifies by stripping leading whitespace, with an optional indent amount.

All three accept ranges, so you can align entire regions at once.

Example

Given a line with the cursor on it:

hello world

Running :.ce 40 produces:

               hello world

Running :.ri 40 produces:

                             hello world

Running :.le strips any leading whitespace:

hello world

Tips

• Apply to the whole file with :%ce 80 to center all lines.
• These commands are especially useful for formatting comment banners or README-style headers.
• In visual-line mode, select multiple lines first, then type :ce — Vim fills in the '<,'> range automatically.
• Set textwidth before using :ce without an argument so you don't need to specify the width each time.