Note: Tips and Tricks has moved to the official Visual Studio Code documentation at code.visualstudio.com.
The content is now at vscode-docs. Pull requests and documentation issues are still greatly appreciated.

1. Basics
2. Customization
3. Extensions
4. File and folder management
5. Editing hacks
6. IntelliSense
7. Snippets
8. Git integration
9. Debugging
10. Task runner
11. Other Resources

The key bindings below may or may not be accurate with the latest build. See here for the latest keyboard shortcut reference.

The Visual Studio Code team uses the Insiders version to test the latest features and bug fixes of VS Code. You can use this same version by downloading here.

• For Early Adopters - Insiders has the most recent code changes and may lead to the occasional broken build.
• Frequent Builds - New builds everyday with the latest bug fixes and features.
• Side-by-side install - Insiders installs next to the Stable build allowing you to use either independently.

Open the Welcome page to get started with the basics of VS Code. Help > Welcome.

Includes the Interactive Playground.

Access all available commands based on your current context.

Mac: cmd shift p or f1

Windows / Linux: ctrl shift p or f1

All of the commands are in the Command Palette with the associated key binding (if it exists). If you forget what the key binding is use the Command Palette to help you out.

Quickly open files.

Mac: cmd p

Windows / Linux: ctrl p

Tip: Type "?" to view help suggestions.

Repeat the Quick Open keyboard shortcut to cycle quickly between recently opened files.

You can open multiple files from Quick Open by pressing the Right arrow key. This will open the currently selected file in the background and you can continue selecting files from Quick Open.

Linux: Follow instructions here.

Windows: Follow instructions here.

Mac: see below.

Open the Command Palette (F1) and type "shell command". Hit enter to execute Shell Command: Install 'code' command in PATH.

# open code with current directory
code .

# open the current directory in the most recently used code window
code -r .

# create a new window
code -n

# change the language
code --locale=es

# open diff editor
code --diff <file1> <file2>

# see help options
code --help

# disable all extensions
code --disable-extensions .

Workspace specific files are in .vscode. For example, tasks.json for the Task Runner and launch.json for the debugger.

Errors and Warnings

Mac: shift cmd m

Windows / Linux: ctrl shift m

Quickly jump to errors and warnings in the project.

Cycle through errors with f8 or shift f8

You can filter problems by type ('errors', 'warnings') or text matching.

Change language mode

Mac: cmd k m

Windows / Linux: ctrl k m

If you want to persist the new language mode for that file type, you can use the Configure File Association for ... command to associate the current file extension with an installed language.

There are many things you can do to customize VS Code.

• Change your theme
• Change your keyboard shortcuts
• Tune your settings
• Add JSON validation
• Create snippets
• Install extensions

Check out the full documentation.

Open the Command Palette and type "themes". You can install more themes from the extension Marketplace.

Additionally, you can install and change your File Icon themes.

Download the keyboard shortcut reference sheet for your platform (macOS, Windows, Linux).

Are you used to keyboard shortcuts from another editor? You can install a Keymap extension that brings the keyboard shortcuts from your favorite editor to VS Code. Go to Preferences > Keymap Extensions to see the current list on the Marketplace. Some of the more popular ones:

• Vim
• Sublime Text Keymap
• Emacs Keymap
• Atom Keymap
• Eclipse Keymap

Open the Command Palette and type "keyboard shortcuts." You can now add your own keybindings in the file on the right.

See more in Key Bindings for Visual Studio Code.

Open settings.json

Mac: cmd ,

Windows / Linux: File > Preferences > Settings or ctrl ,

Format on paste

"editor.formatOnPaste": true

Change the font size

"editor.fontSize": 18

Change the zoom level

"window.zoomLevel": 5

Font ligatures

"editor.fontFamily": "Fira Code",
"editor.fontLigatures": true

Tip: You will need to have a font installed that supports font ligatures. FiraCode is a popular font on the VS Code team.

Auto Save

"files.autoSave": "afterDelay"

You can also toggle Auto Save from the top-level menu with the File > Auto Save.

Format on save

"editor.formatOnSave": true,

Change the size of tab characters

"editor.tabSize": 4

Spaces or tabs

"editor.insertSpaces": true

Render whitespace

"editor.renderWhitespace": "all"

Ignore files / folders

Removes these files / folders from your editor window.

"files.exclude": {
        "somefolder/": true,
        "somefile": true
}

Remove these files / folders from search results.

"search.exclude": {
    "someFolder/": true,
    "somefile": true
}

And many, many others.

For those settings you only want for specific languages.

"[languageid]": {

}

Tip: You can find the language ID by typing in the Command Palette "Configure language specific settings"

Enabled by default for many files. Create your own schema and validation in settings.json

"json.schemas": [
    {
        "fileMatch": [
            "/bower.json"
        ],
        "url": "http://json.schemastore.org/bower"
    }
]

or for a schema defined in your workspace

"json.schemas": [
    {
        "fileMatch": [
            "/foo.json"
        ],
        "url": "./myschema.json"
    }
]

or a custom schema

"json.schemas": [
    {
        "fileMatch": [
            "/.myconfig"
        ],
        "schema": {
            "type": "object",
            "properties": {
                "name" : {
                    "type": "string",
                    "description": "The name of the entry"
                }
            }
        }
    },

See more in the documentation.

1. In the VS Code Marketplace.
2. Search inside VS Code
3. View extension recommendations
4. Community curated extension lists, such as awesome-vscode

Click the Extensions Activity Bar button. You can search via the search bar or click the More (...) button to filter and sort by install count.

Click the Extensions Activity Bar button. Then click Show Recommended Extensions in the More (...) button menu.

Are you interested in creating your own extension? You can learn how to do this in the documentation, specifically check out the documentation on contribution points. A simple "Hello, world" tutorial can be found here.

• configuration
• commands
• keybindings
• languages
• debuggers
• grammars
• themes
• snippets
• jsonValidation

Windows / Linux / Mac: ctrl `

Further reading:

• Official documentation
• Mastering VS Code's Terminal article

Open settings.json with cmd ,

"files.autoSave": "afterDelay"

You can also toggle Auto Save from the top-level menu with the File > Auto Save.

Mac: cmd b

Windows / Linux: ctrl b

Mac: cmd k z

Windows / Linux: ctrl k z

Enter distraction free Zen mode.

Mac: cmd \ or cmd then click a file from the File Explorer.

Windows / Linux: ctrl \

Linux: ctrl 2

You can use drag and drop editors to create new editor groups and move editors between groups.

Mac: cmd 1, cmd 2, cmd 3

Windows / Linux: ctrl 1, ctrl 2, ctrl 3

Mac: cmd shift e

Windows / Linux: ctrl shift e

Mac: cmd click

Windows / Linux: ctrl click

Mac: cmd w

Windows / Linux: ctrl k f

Navigate entire history with ctrl tab

Navigate back.

Mac: ctrl -

Windows / Linux: alt left

Navigate Forward.

Mac: ctrl shift -

Windows / Linux: alt right

Mac: cmd e or cmd p

Windows / Linux: ctrl e or ctrl p

Create language associations for files that aren't detected accurately (for example, many config files are JSON).

"file.associations": {
    ".database": "json"
}

Here are a selection of common features for editing code. If the keyboard shortcuts aren't comfortable for you, consider installing a Keymap extension for your old editor.

Mac: opt cmd up or opt cmd down

Windows: ctrl alt up or ctrl alt down

Linux: alt shift up or alt shift down

Add more cursors to current selection.

Mac: ctrl j

Windows / Linux: Not bound by default. Open Keyboard Shortcuts and bind editor.action.joinLines to a shortcut of your choice.

Mac: opt shift up or opt shift down

Windows / Linux(Issue #5363): shift alt down or shift alt up

More in documentation

Mac: ctrl shift cmd left or ctrl shift cmd right

Windows / Linux: shift alt left or shift alt right

Mac: cmd shift o

Windows / Linux: ctrl shift o

You can group the symbols by kind by adding a colon, @:.

Mac: cmd t

Windows / Linux: ctrl t

Mac: ctrl g or cmd p, :

Windows / Linux: ctrl g

Mac: cmd u

Windows / Linux: ctrl u

Mac: opt up or opt down

Windows / Linux: alt up or alt down

Mac: cmd k cmd x

Windows / Linux: ctrl k ctrl x

Mac: cmd k, cmd f

Windows / Linux: ctrl k, ctrl f

Windows / Linux: shift alt f

Mac: alt cmd [ and alt cmd ]

Windows / Linux: ctrl shift [ and ctrl shift ]

Mac: cmd i

Windows / Linux: ctrl i

Mac: cmd up and cmd down

Windows: ctrl up and ctrl down

Linux: ctrl home and ctrl end

In a Markdown file, use

Mac: shift cmd v

Windows / Linux: ctrl shift v

In a Markdown file, use

Mac: cmd k v

Windows / Linux: ctrl k v

Special bonus: The preview will now sync.

Anytime, try ctrl space to trigger the Suggestions widget.

You can view available methods, parameter hints, short documentation, etc.

Select a symbol then type alt f12. Alternatively, you can use the context menu.

Select a symbol then type f12. Alternatively, you can use the context menu or ctrl click (cmd click on macOS).

You can go back to your previous location with the Go > Back command or alt left (ctrl - on macOS).

Select a symbol then type shift f12. Alternatively, you can use the context menu.

Select a symbol then type f2. Alternatively, you can use the context menu.

Install the ESLint extension. Configure your linter however you'd like. Specification is here.

Here is configuration to use ES6.

{
    "env": {
        "browser": true,
        "commonjs": true,
        "es6": true,
        "node": true
    },
    "parserOptions": {
        "ecmaVersion": 6,
        "sourceType": "module",
        "ecmaFeatures": {
            "jsx": true,
            "classes": true,
            "defaultParams": true
        }
    },
    "rules": {
        "no-const-assign": 1,
        "no-extra-semi": 0,
        "semi": 0,
        "no-fallthrough": 0,
        "no-empty": 0,
        "no-mixed-spaces-and-tabs": 0,
        "no-redeclare": 0,
        "no-this-before-super": 1,
        "no-undef": 1,
        "no-unreachable": 1,
        "no-use-before-define": 0,
        "constructor-super": 1,
        "curly": 0,
        "eqeqeq": 0,
        "func-names": 0,
        "valid-typeof": 1
    }
}

See IntelliSense for your package.json file.

Support for Emmet syntax.

File > Preferences > User Snippets, select the language, and create a snippet.

"create component": {
    "prefix": "component",
    "body": [
        "class $1 extends React.Component {",
        "",
        "	render() {",
        "		return ($2);",
        " 	}",
        "",
        "}"
    ]
},

See more details in Creating your own Snippets.

Git integration comes with VS Code "in-the-box". You can install other SCM provider from the extension Marketplace. This section describes the Git integration but much of the UI and gestures are shared by other SCM providers.

Click the Source Control button in the Activity Bar then select the file to diff.

Side by side

Default is side by side diff.

Inline view

Toggle inline view by clicking the More (...) button in the top right and selecting Switch to Inline View.

If you prefer the inline view, you can set "diffEditor.renderSideBySide": false.

Review Pane

Navigate through diffs with F7 and Shift F7. This will present them in a unified patch format. Lines can be navigated with arrow keys and pressing Enter will jump back in the diff editor and the selected line.

Edit pending changes

You can make edits directly in the pending changes of the diff view.

Easily switch between Git branches via the Status Bar.

Stage all

Hover over the number of files and click the plus button.

Stage selected

Stage a portion of a file by selecting that file (using the arrows) and then choosing Stage Selected Ranges from the Command Palette.

VS Code makes it easy to see what Git commands are actually running. This is helpful when learning Git or debugging a difficult source control issue.

Mac: shift cmd u

Windows / Linux: ctrl shift u

to run toggleOutput. Select Git in the drop-down.

View diff decorations in editor. See documentation for more details.

During a merge, click the Source Control button in the Activity Bar and make changes in the diff view. Select and accept current, incoming or both changes in just one click.

git config --global merge.tool code

Review pull requests inside vscode vscode-pull-request-github

f1 and select Debug: Open launch.json, select the environment. This will generate a launch.json file. Works out of the box as expected for Node.js and other environments. May need some additional configuration for other languages. See documentation for more details.

Place breakpoints next to the line number. Navigate forward with the Debug widget.

Inspect variables in the Debug panels and in the console.

You can set "debug.inlineValues": true to see variable values inline in the debugger. This feature is experimental and disabled by default.

Select Tasks from the top-level menu, run the command Configure Tasks..., then select the type of task you'd like to run. This will generate a tasks.json file with content like the following. See the Tasks documentation for more details.

{
    // See http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=733558
    // for the documentation about the tasks.json format
    "version": "0.1.0",
    "command": "npm",
    "isShellCommand": true,
    "showOutput": "always",
    "suppressTaskName": true,
    "tasks": [
        {
            "taskName": "install",
            "args": ["install"]
        },
        {
            "taskName": "build",
            "args": ["run", "build"]
        }
    ]
}

There are occasionally issues with auto generation. Check out the documentation for getting things to work properly.

Select Tasks from the top-level menu, run the command Run Task..., and select the task you want to run. Terminate the running task by running the command Terminate Task...

• vscode official docs
• react sample app
• awesome vscode
• vscode can do that