Vim keyboard shortcuts

Moving, editing, searching, and window commands in the Vim text editor.

81 shortcuts Linux and Mac checked September 14, 2026

Print all 81 shortcuts One sheet with every shortcut in this app, ready for the printer or a PDF.

33 actions and 66 key variants match.

Vim Documented

Matching shortcuts
Action	Keys	Row actions
Go to where the word is defined Normal mode	Linux `GD` 1 more variant	Source
Complete with the next matching word Insert mode	Linux `CtrlN` 1 more variant	Source
Complete with the previous matching word Insert mode	Linux `CtrlP` 1 more variant	Source

About Vim and its shortcuts

Vim is the odd one out on this site, and deliberately so. It is modal: most of what other editors do with held combinations, Vim does with single letters typed in normal mode, which is why its commands are case sensitive and why a stray keypress can change what the next one means. Learning the modes matters more than learning any individual key.

Vim is endlessly configurable, so a configured installation may share little with the defaults published here. Commands also differ between terminal Vim, graphical versions and the Vim emulation built into other editors.

Where the Vim keys came from

Read from 1 documentation page published by the makers of Vim. Report a key that is wrong

Vim help: index.txt - vim/vim

To see how one action is done in other apps as well as Vim, browse the shortcuts by task. Shortcuts by task