Most Used Vim Commands for Daily Coding

For my personal daily references.

Modes

• Normal mode (default) → navigation, editing commands.
• Insert mode → i (insert before cursor), a (append after cursor), o (new line below).
• Visual mode → v (character select), V (line select), Ctrl+v (block select).
• Command-line mode → : for commands (save, quit, search, etc).

Movement

• h j k l - Left, down, up, right (basic movement)
• w b - Jump forward/backward by word
• 0 $ - Beginning/end of line
• ^ - First non-blank character of line
• gg G - Go to first/last line of file
• { } - Jump between paragraphs/blocks
• Ctrl+u Ctrl+d - Half page up/down
• Ctrl+b Ctrl+f - Full page up/down
• :n: Go to line number n
• :set nu: Show line numbers

Editing Modes

• i a - Insert before cursor / Insert after cursor
• I A - Insert at beginning/end of line
• o O - Open new line below/above
• v V - Visual mode / Visual line mode
• Ctrl+v - Visual block mode

Essential Editing

• x - Delete character under cursor
• dw- Delete word
• dd - Delete entire line
• D - Delete to end of line
• yy - Copy (yank) line
• yw - Copy (yank) word
• p P - Paste after/before cursor
• u Ctrl+r - Undo/redo
• r - Replace single character
• c - Change (delete and enter insert mode)
• . - Repeat last command

Search & Replace

• / - Search forward
• ? - Search backward
• n N - Next/previous search result
• :%s/old/new/g - Replace all occurrences in file
• :s/old/new/g - Replace all occurrences in current line

File Operations

• :w - Save the current file
• :wq - Save and quit
• :x - Save and quit (alternative)
• :q - Quit Vim
• :q! - Quit without saving
• :e filename - Open a file
• :split filename or :vsplit filename - Open file in horizontal/vertical split view

Code-Specific

• >> << - Indent/unindent line
• = - Auto-indent selection
• % - Jump to matching bracket/parenthesis
• * - Find next occurrence of word under cursor
• ~ - Toggle case of character under cursor
• g~ - Toggle case of selected text
• Ctrl+o Ctrl+i - Jump to previous/next location in jump list

Combining Commands

• dw - Delete word
• d$ - Delete to end of line
• y$ - Copy to end of line
• c$ - Change to end of line
• 5dd - Delete 5 lines
• 3w - Move 3 words forward

Window Management

• :split - Split window
• :vsplit - Vertical split window
• Ctrl+w h/j/k/l - Move between split windows