invisible-squiggles

The Invisible Squiggles VSCode extension allows you to selectively toggle error, warning, info, and hint squiggles for a distraction-free coding experience.

🔹 Features

✅ Toggle squiggles on/off globally or by type from the status bar or command palette
✅ Independently control hint, info, warning, and error squiggles
✅ The Problems panel follows along — its icons take their color from the editor's diagnostic colors, so hiding squiggles fades them too

demo

Why not use the built-in "Problems: Visibility" setting?

VS Code's built-in setting (problems.visibility) hides all problem decorations when turned off — but it always shows a warning in the status bar while they're hidden. Invisible Squiggles gives you:

No forced status bar clutter — The status bar indicator is optional and can be disabled.
Choose subsets — Hide only errors, only warnings, only info, only hints, or any combination. The built-in option is all-or-nothing.

🔹 Quickstart

Install the extension from the VSCode marketplace, or from Open VSX if you use Cursor, Windsurf, VSCodium, or Gitpod.
Toggle squiggles using one of these methods:

Option 1: Using the Status Bar Button

Click Squiggles: at the bottom right. The eye beside it shows the current state — open while squiggles are visible, closed while they are hidden.

Option 2: Using the Command Palette

Press Ctrl/Cmd + Shift + P.
Type Toggle Squiggles.
Select the command to hide/show squiggles.

Option 3: Using a Keyboard Shortcut

There is no default shortcut, so pick one that suits you:

Press Ctrl/Cmd + K then Ctrl/Cmd + S to open Keyboard Shortcuts.
Search for Toggle Squiggles.
Click the + beside it and press your key combination.

Or add it to keybindings.json yourself:

{ "key": "ctrl+alt+s", "command": "invisible-squiggles.toggle" }

🔹 Settings

Everything lives under invisibleSquiggles and applies globally.

Setting	Default	Effect
`hideErrors`	`true`	Hide error squiggles when toggling.
`hideWarnings`	`true`	Hide warning squiggles when toggling.
`hideInfo`	`true`	Hide info squiggles when toggling.
`hideHint`	`true`	Hide hint squiggles when toggling.
`showStatusBarMessage`	`false`	Show a brief status bar message on each toggle.
`startHidden`	`false`	Hide squiggles automatically when VSCode starts.

The four hide* settings choose which squiggle types the toggle acts on — this is the "independently control" part. Set hideErrors to false and errors stay visible while warnings, info, and hints disappear. Turn all four off and the toggle has nothing to act on.

🔹 Important Notes

Manual edits will be overwritten: When squiggles are hidden, the extension stores your original color customizations and applies transparent colors. Toggling squiggles will overwrite any manual changes you make to these colors while they're hidden.
Customizations stored in settings: Your original color customizations are saved in VS Code's settings.json. If this file becomes corrupted, your saved customizations may be lost.
Upgrading while hidden: you may need to toggle twice to reset the state.

invisible squiggles

Michael I Chen