Light Emacs Bindings

日本語版はこちら / Japanese version here → README.ja.md

Ever had an Emacs keybinding extension quietly break copy-paste on you — working in one panel, dead in another? Not this one. Copy, Cut, and Paste stay exactly as VS Code intends, always, everywhere. This extension only adds the Emacs muscle memory that doesn't fight your editor — and anywhere a conflict truly can't be avoided, it's documented up front and can be switched off in one click.

Policy

Copy / Cut / Paste (Ctrl+C / Ctrl+X / Ctrl+V) are never broken. Ctrl+X doubles as the Emacs C-x prefix, but if nothing follows within ~1 second it automatically falls back to a native Cut — see How Ctrl+X works.
Every other override is listed below, and every feature group can be toggled independently from VS Code's own Settings UI — no custom webview, no extra app to learn.

Keybindings by category

Movement

Key	Action	Overrides
`Ctrl+F`	forward-char	Find (still reachable via `Ctrl+S` or the Command Palette)
`Ctrl+B`	backward-char	Toggle Sidebar Visibility
`Ctrl+N`	next-line	New File
`Ctrl+P`	previous-line	Quick Open
`Ctrl+A`	beginning-of-line	Select All
`Ctrl+E`	end-of-line	(unbound by default)
`Alt+F`	forward-word	File-menu mnemonic (only if the menu bar is shown)
`Alt+B`	backward-word	—
`Alt+V`	scroll up a page	—
`Alt+Shift+,` (`Alt+<`)	beginning-of-buffer	—
`Alt+Shift+.` (`Alt+>`)	end-of-buffer	—

Ctrl+V and Ctrl+C are never bound by this extension — Paste and Copy stay native.

Mark & selection

Key	Action	Overrides
`Ctrl+Space`	set-mark-command — start a selection, extend it by moving	Trigger Suggest (manual invocation only; auto-popups while typing are unaffected)
`Ctrl+X Space`	toggle rectangle (column) selection	(see Ctrl+X)
`Ctrl+G`	keyboard-quit — clear mark/selection, cancel a pending `Ctrl+X`	Go to Line (still on the Command Palette)

Search

Key	Action	Overrides
`Ctrl+S`	isearch-forward — open search, then jump to the next match on repeat	Save (moved to `Ctrl+X Ctrl+S`)
`Ctrl+R`	isearch-backward — open search, then jump to the previous match on repeat	Switch Window/Workspace

File & editing

Key	Action	Overrides
`Ctrl+X Ctrl+F`	find-file — opens Quick Open	(see Ctrl+X)
`Ctrl+X Ctrl+S`	save-buffer — saves the current file	(see Ctrl+X)
`Ctrl+K`	kill-line — delete to end of line (joining the next line at EOL), copied to the clipboard	VS Code's entire `Ctrl+K …` chord family (comment toggling, formatting, Zen Mode, etc. — still on the Command Palette)
`Ctrl+;`	comment-line — toggle the line comment	(unbound by default — this is where VS Code's own Toggle Line Comment moved to)
`Ctrl+/`	undo	Toggle Line Comment (moved to `Ctrl+;`)
`Ctrl+Shift+/`	redo (Emacs-style `C-?` convention)	(unbound by default) — `Ctrl+Z`/`Ctrl+Y` keep working natively too

Commands

Key	Action	Overrides
`Alt+X`	execute-extended-command — opens the Command Palette	(unbound by default)
(unbound — bind your own)	`Light Emacs Bindings: Toggle Enabled` — flips the master switch	—

How `Ctrl+X` works

Ctrl+X is not implemented as a native VS Code chord. VS Code has a confirmed, open limitation (microsoft/vscode#140226): once a key is registered as the first half of a chord, pressing it alone and not following up doesn't fall back to whatever it used to do — it's just silently swallowed. For Ctrl+X, that would mean losing Cut. So instead:

Ctrl+X alone starts a ~1 second window.
Ctrl+F (go to file), Space (toggle rectangle selection), or Ctrl+S (save) within that window does the corresponding action.
Nothing follows within the window → a native Cut fires automatically, exactly as bare Ctrl+X always would.
Ctrl+G cancels the window without cutting.

Overrides at a glance

VS Code default this replaces	Still reachable via
Toggle Sidebar Visibility (`Ctrl+B`)	View menu / Command Palette
New File (`Ctrl+N`)	File menu / Command Palette
Quick Open (`Ctrl+P`)	`Ctrl+X Ctrl+F` / Command Palette
Find (`Ctrl+F`)	`Ctrl+S` / Command Palette
Go to Line (`Ctrl+G`)	Command Palette
Select All (`Ctrl+A`)	Edit menu / Command Palette
Trigger Suggest, manual (`Ctrl+Space`)	Command Palette
Toggle Line Comment (`Ctrl+/`)	`Ctrl+;`
Save (`Ctrl+S`)	`Ctrl+X Ctrl+S` / File menu
Switch Window/Workspace (`Ctrl+R`)	Command Palette
`Ctrl+K …` chord family	Command Palette

Copy, Cut, and Paste are never in this table — they're not touched.

Settings

Search "Light Emacs Bindings" in VS Code's Settings UI, or edit settings.json directly:

Setting	Default	Controls
`lightEmacsBindings.enable`	`true`	Master switch for every keybinding
`lightEmacsBindings.movement.enabled`	`true`	Movement category
`lightEmacsBindings.mark.enabled`	`true`	Mark (`Ctrl+Space`)
`lightEmacsBindings.rectangleSelection.enabled`	`true`	Rectangle selection (`Ctrl+X Space`)
`lightEmacsBindings.goToFile.enabled`	`true`	Go to file (`Ctrl+X Ctrl+F`)
`lightEmacsBindings.save.enabled`	`true`	Save (`Ctrl+X Ctrl+S`)
`lightEmacsBindings.commandPalette.enabled`	`true`	Command Palette (`Alt+X`)
`lightEmacsBindings.killLine.enabled`	`true`	Kill-line (`Ctrl+K`)
`lightEmacsBindings.comment.enabled`	`true`	Comment toggle (`Ctrl+;`)
`lightEmacsBindings.undoRedo.enabled`	`true`	Undo/Redo (`Ctrl+/` / `Ctrl+Shift+/`)
`lightEmacsBindings.incrementalSearch.enabled`	`true`	Search (`Ctrl+S` / `Ctrl+R`)

{
  "lightEmacsBindings.movement.enabled": false,
  "lightEmacsBindings.killLine.enabled": false
}

Bind your own toggle key

lightEmacsBindings.toggleEnabled ships with no default keybinding. Add one in keybindings.json:

{
  "key": "ctrl+alt+e",
  "command": "lightEmacsBindings.toggleEnabled"
}

Known limitations / Roadmap

Keyboard macros are out of scope for v1. VS Code has no general-purpose macro-recording API and no way to intercept arbitrary command execution. A future version might offer a scoped recorder limited to this extension's own commands (movement, mark, rectangle selection, go-to-file, etc.) — that would be low-risk; a general one would not.
If you disable only one of rectangleSelection.enabled / goToFile.enabled / save.enabled, its Ctrl+X follow-up key falls through to that key's own VS Code default during the ~1 second window instead of doing nothing.
Alt+F / Alt+B may collide with File-menu mnemonics if your menu bar is visible (no issue if it's hidden).

Requirements

VS Code 1.85.0 or later.

Development

npm install       # install dependencies
npm run compile   # type-check, then bundle with esbuild
npm run watch     # rebuild on save
npm test          # run the vitest unit tests
npm run icon      # regenerate images/icon.png from images/icon.svg
npm run package   # produce a .vsix

Press F5 in VS Code to launch an Extension Development Host with this extension loaded.

Release

Push a v* tag to trigger .github/workflows/release.yml, which builds a .vsix and attaches it to a GitHub Release.

License

MIT — see LICENSE.

Light Emacs Bindings

Nobuyuki Inaba

Light Emacs Bindings

Policy

Keybindings by category

Movement

Mark & selection

Search

File & editing

Commands

How Ctrl+X works

Overrides at a glance

Settings

Bind your own toggle key

Known limitations / Roadmap

Requirements

Development

Release

License

How `Ctrl+X` works