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I believe I can do something like export EDITOR=vi, but I'm not sure what exactly to enter, and where.

How can I set "vi" as my default editor?

Donny P
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4 Answers4

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You should add it to your shell’s configuration file. For Bash, this is ~/.bashrc or ~/.bash_profile (see detailed comparison). You should also set $VISUAL, as some programs (correctly) use that instead of $EDITOR (see VISUAL vs. EDITOR). Additionally, unless you know why, you should set it to vim instead of vi.

TL;DR, add the following to your shell configuration (probably ~/.bashrc):

export VISUAL=vim
export EDITOR="$VISUAL"
Andrew Marshall
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  • Not working for me! I still see a number after: "sudo crontab -e" instead of editing crontab! – Mohsen Abasi Jun 26 '18 at 09:34
  • @MohsenAbasi What do you mean “I still see a number?”. Check that `EDITOR` is in both your environment (`env | grep EDITOR`) and is passed to `sudo` (`sudo env | grep EDITOR`), as your system’s sudo security policy may prohibit it (see `man sudo` for more details). – Andrew Marshall Jun 26 '18 at 17:18
  • I mean that I still see just a number (not opening 'vim' editor) after executing: 'sudo crontab -e'. Since there is no default editor for editing cron jobs in my Ubuntu. To have a default editor, your solution does nothing for me. Only solution of 'DobesVandermeer' works. – Mohsen Abasi Jun 27 '18 at 06:08
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    Once it is done, reload the config with `. ~/.bashrc` – Jona Feb 18 '21 at 20:47
  • I had to use `/usr/bin/vi` rather than `vim` otherwise `crontab -e` failed with the error `crontab /bin/sh: 1: vim: not found`. – SharpC Jan 28 '23 at 13:24
  • @AndrewMarshall given this is such a noob question it's probably a good idea to point out that a restart of `bash` or `source ~/.bashrc`, whatever, is required to update the environment after you've edited the file. As Jona points out. – NeilG Jun 21 '23 at 19:45
173

On Ubuntu and other Ubuntu/Debian-based Linux systems, you can explicitly set the default text editor at the system level by providing its path to update-alternatives:

Automatic, Scripted

sudo update-alternatives --set editor /usr/bin/vim.basic
sudo update-alternatives --set vi /usr/bin/vim.basic

Note

If your distro doesn't call it /usr/bin/vim.basic, you can find out which path to use with the --list argument:

sudo update-alternatives --list editor

/bin/ed
/bin/nano
/usr/bin/vim.basic
/usr/bin/vim.tiny

Manual, Interactive

Or, to see all options and choose interactively:

sudo update-alternatives --config editor
roaima
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Rick
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    This set the default for `git` too, which was exactly what I needed. – Kzqai Mar 09 '16 at 18:26
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    This set the default for `ranger` too, which was exactly what I needed. PS: just for helping index for people who is trying to do the same. – wviana Dec 06 '16 at 16:42
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    Only this worked for me on Ubuntu server 18.04 – user3751385 Sep 17 '18 at 17:55
  • Not within FreeBSD https://www.freebsd.org/cgi/man.cgi?query=update-alternatives&apropos=0&sektion=0&manpath=FreeBSD+12.2-RELEASE but within the port of dkpg https://www.freshports.org/archivers/dpkg/ – Graham Perrin Dec 25 '20 at 09:05
  • This works with my version of WSL2/Ubuntu on Windows 10. – staylorx Apr 11 '22 at 21:27
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In recent versions of Ubuntu you use the alternatives system to manage the default, editor, e.g.:

update-alternatives --set editor /usr/bin/vim.basic

To see which editors are available for use:

update-alternatives --list editor

Some UNIX distributions might provide a select-editor command:

select-editor

And it will ask you which editor to use.

Make sure you actually have vim installed before trying to set it as your default editor.

Dobes Vandermeer
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If bash is your shell, then insert it into .bash_profile in your home directory; if zsh is your shell, then insert it into .zprofile; for other shells see the according documentation.

countermode
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  • On zsh I recommend putting it into `.zshenv` instead. – pepoluan Oct 20 '20 at 09:23
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    @pepoluan If you see this, could you please elaborate? The `.zprofile` file will be read for each and every shell invocation. It seems odd to want to set the editor for shell sessions that aren't even interactive. – Kusalananda Dec 28 '20 at 19:02
  • @Kusalananda it's just setting an env var anyways, so not harmful. If you need to, say `su` into your account, `.zshenv` will be sourced. – pepoluan Dec 29 '20 at 04:55
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    Why not put it in `.zshrc` for `zsh` as the top-vote opts for `.bashrc`? – Timo May 03 '23 at 11:57
  • You shouldn't go around putting it into things like that. – NeilG Jun 21 '23 at 19:45