Khang Nguyen

is a writer.

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The first movements you should already know if you’re using vim are the h, j, k, and l keys.

It’s key to first get comfortable with these before progressing to faster moves, but if you’re ready, do read on. I will be splitting this article into three parts:

• Vertical movements, to get you to the line you want
• Horizontal movements, to get you to the character you want
• Precise movements, to get straight there

Also, I will be using vimscript to describe the keys to press, so u simply press u but <C-u> means press Ctrl+u. <CR> means Enter.

Vertical Movements

Vertical movements get your cursor to the right general area. The first of its kind is to simply bring you to the ends of the buffer:

• gg puts you at the first line
• G puts you at the last line

For half-page jumps, use <C-d> and <C-u>, with the length of one page being the number of lines visible in that vim window.

• <C-d> moves your cursor half a page down
• <C-u> moves your cursor half a page up

To jump an exact number of lines, type the number of lines first, then press j or k depending on the direction in which you wish to jump.

• 12j puts your cursor 12 lines below its previous position
• 7k puts your cursor 7 lines above its previous position

Horizontal Movements

These movements are within the line you’re on. The point of moving faster horizontally is to get to the exact character you want.

• w puts your cursor at the first character of the next word.
• b puts your cursor at the first character of the current/previous word.

For more precise movements, make use of f and t. These searches for the key you press next.

• fr puts your cursor exactly on the next “r” on that line. If there are no “r”s to the right of your cursor, it will not move.
• td puts your cursor one character before the next “d” on that line.

F and T function similarly, but in reverse.

• Fr puts your cursor exactly on the previous “r” on that line. If there are no “r”s to the left of your cursor, it will not move.
• Td puts your cursor one character to the right of the previous “d” on that line.

Precise Movements

To get to exactly where you want immediately, use / or ? and start typing your search query.

• /print<CR> will bring you to the next instance of “print” in the buffer.
• ?echo<CR> will bring you to the previous instance of “echo” in the buffer.

This is definitely the fastest way to move if you already know a word near where you want to go.