{"slug": "ideavim", "name": "IdeaVim", "category": "editors", "category_name": "Editors and IDEs", "description": "", "recommenders": 4, "commenters": 7, "warners": 1, "score": 3.077, "rising": 0.02, "first": "2025-11-13", "latest": "2026-10-29", "why": "I use ideavim with configuration as close as possible to astronvim", "why_is_quote": true, "has_verdict": false, "sentiment": {"recommend": 4, "neutral": 2, "compare": 0, "warn": 3}, "spark": [1, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 2, 0, 0, 0, 0, 1], "listed": true, "loved": [], "caveat": "", "short_quote": "I use ideavim with configuration as close as possible to astronvim", "kind": "", "icon": false, "domain": null, "github_repo": null, "official_url": "https://github.com/JetBrains/ideavim", "pricing": "", "aliases": ["IdeaVim", "IdeaVIM"], "verdict": null, "praise": [{"label": "", "summary": "", "quotes": [{"id": 804617364, "item_id": 50288585, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50288585", "by": "wilkystyle", "date": "2026-10-29", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "IntelliJ's idea Vim plugin is a pretty decent one", "excerpt": "(not the person you are replying to) I am primarily an Emacs user, using the standard key bindings (and a whole bunch of custom bindings and functions I've built on top of it over the decades, ctrl remaped to caps lock and no Emacs pinky so far). But I am also 80% a NeoVim and Vim user for about 15 years now, and I consider myself quite proficient with Vim keybindings. The Emacs emulation is truly incredible, but the", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Emacs Turns 50"}, {"id": 770979313, "item_id": 48186207, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48186207", "by": "efortis", "date": "2026-05-18", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "if you use IdeaVim you can", "excerpt": "> I cannot instantly create a new file Agreed, but if you use IdeaVim you can: :e src/my_new_file.txt > The startup times are just abysmal For quick edits I just use Vim, but disabling unused plugins speeds up startup quiet a bit. -- > Switching projects has abysmal performance I reported that bug: https://youtrack.jetbrains.com/issue/JUNIE-2563/Minor-UX-Slow-teardown", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "No More JetBrains Products for Me"}, {"id": 768026210, "item_id": 48001638, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48001638", "by": "jbvlkt", "date": "2026-05-03", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I use ideavim with configuration as close as possible to astronvim", "excerpt": "I have just combined those together. I use astronvim as main editor but when I need IDE I switch to Idea. I use ideavim with configuration as close as possible to astronvim. So text editing is the same for me in both programs. Modal editors are still great and they can do a lot of work that looks like magic for AI era trained developers.", "context": "", "use_case": "Vim keybindings in IDE", "switched_from": "", "story": "Why TUIs Are Back"}, {"id": 735375681, "item_id": 45960980, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45960980", "by": "t_mahmood", "date": "2025-11-17", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "IdeaVIM makes IntelliJ more useful for me.", "excerpt": "No issues here, except for you being an Emacs user :D > IntelliJ is to blame for why my transition to Emacs took me two years ... It was a bit opposite for me, I jumped around so many editors, and, then I fell in love with VIM, spent so many hours to get the config that meets my need, dissed many Emac users. And, now after many years, as I grew, I realized, these are tools, and at the end, it's all on the user who ma", "context": "", "use_case": "Vim keybindings in IntelliJ", "switched_from": "", "story": "IDEmacs: A Visual Studio Code clone for Emacs"}, {"id": 735155941, "item_id": 45947246, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45947246", "by": "t_mahmood", "date": "2025-11-16", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "IntelliJ shines when you use the command pallet, keyboard shortcuts, and IdeaVIM", "excerpt": "IntelliJ shines when you use the command pallet, keyboard shortcuts, and IdeaVIM Double shift, to bring up the pallet, and start typing. Though it also have a ton of shortcuts, and shortcuts can be assigned for almost every command. Try this: https://plugins.jetbrains.com/plugin/9792-key-promoter-x/ Whenever you don't use keyboard shortcut for any action, this suggests you the available keyboard shortcut.", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "IDEmacs: A Visual Studio Code clone for Emacs"}]}], "caveats": [{"label": "", "summary": "", "quotes": [{"id": 804666514, "item_id": 50291657, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50291657", "by": "iLemming", "date": "2026-10-29", "stance": "warn", "quote": "no single editor or IDE, not a single vim emulation layer properly works, they all have glaring deficiencies", "excerpt": "> Vim implementation quality varies wildly from environment to environment is extremely frustrating to me. I know exactly what you're talking about. I am a die-hard vimmer and used vim plugins in every editor/IDE/browser/shell/multiplexer/WM/etc. I use vim bindings system-wide. I control my music, switch between apps, swap and resize windows - all without lifting a finger from the home-row. I spent almost a decade li", "context": "lived in IntelliJ for almost a decade", "use_case": "Vim emulation in IntelliJ", "switched_from": "", "story": "Emacs Turns 50"}, {"id": 777436323, "item_id": 48589770, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48589770", "by": "iLemming", "date": "2026-06-18", "stance": "warn", "quote": "not Sublime, not IntelliJ with IdeaVim have ever fully implemented vim motions to the degree where it doesn't feel foreign", "excerpt": "I'm a die-hard vimmer. I use vim-motions everywhere - they permeate my editors/IDEs, browsers, terminal, I use them system wide (e.g. to change volume or control media or my WM). One day I woke up with the realization of the fundamental truth - Emacs simply vims better. Much better than even Neovim. I just had to master Vim and grok some Lisp to arrive to that conclusion. People fighting Vim vs. Emacs are materially ", "context": "", "use_case": "Vim emulation", "switched_from": "", "story": "Emacs 31 Is Around the Corner: The Changes I'm Daily Driving"}, {"id": 735172805, "item_id": 45948300, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45948300", "by": "iLemming", "date": "2025-11-16", "stance": "warn", "quote": "IdeaVIM is good enough, but only to the point", "excerpt": "IntelliJ is an amazing feat of software engineering, there's no denying that. I'm not saying that to make you (or any other WebStorm/Pycharm/etc. user) feel better - I know that from years of dedicated use. I just want to share my anecdotal, personal story. I used IntelliJ professionally for almost a decade. I learned some advanced and undocumented features. I've collaborated with Jetbrains team members to help impro", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "IDEmacs: A Visual Studio Code clone for Emacs"}]}], "who": [], "tags": [], "use_cases": ["vim keybindings in intellij", "vim emulation in intellij", "vim emulation", "vim keybindings in ide"], "compared": [{"slug": "intellij-idea", "name": "IntelliJ IDEA", "co": 6, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 0}, {"slug": "vim", "name": "Vim", "co": 5, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 0}, {"slug": "gnu-emacs", "name": "GNU Emacs", "co": 4, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 0}, {"slug": "evil", "name": "Evil", "co": 3, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 0}, {"slug": "neovim", "name": "Neovim", "co": 3, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 0}, {"slug": "visual-studio-code", "name": "Visual Studio Code", "co": 2, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 0}], "makers": [], "threads": [{"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45941835", "title": "IDEmacs: A Visual Studio Code clone for Emacs", "mentions": 3}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50273171", "title": "Emacs Turns 50", "mentions": 2}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48584135", "title": "Emacs 31 Is Around the Corner: The Changes I'm Daily Driving", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48185188", "title": "No More JetBrains Products for Me", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48000028", "title": "Why TUIs Are Back", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46021577", "title": "Surprisingly, Emacs on Android is pretty good", "mentions": 1}], "sentiment_by_month": {"2025-11": {"neutral": 2, "recommend": 1, "warn": 1}, "2025-12": {}, "2026-01": {}, "2026-02": {}, "2026-03": {}, "2026-04": {}, "2026-05": {"recommend": 2}, "2026-06": {"warn": 1}, "2026-07": {}, "2026-08": {}, "2026-09": {}, "2026-10": {"recommend": 1, "warn": 1}}, "quotes": [{"id": 804666514, "item_id": 50291657, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50291657", "by": "iLemming", "date": "2026-10-29", "stance": "warn", "quote": "no single editor or IDE, not a single vim emulation layer properly works, they all have glaring deficiencies", "excerpt": "> Vim implementation quality varies wildly from environment to environment is extremely frustrating to me. I know exactly what you're talking about. I am a die-hard vimmer and used vim plugins in every editor/IDE/browser/shell/multiplexer/WM/etc. I use vim bindings system-wide. I control my music, switch between apps, swap and resize windows - all without lifting a finger from the home-row. I spent almost a decade li", "context": "lived in IntelliJ for almost a decade", "use_case": "Vim emulation in IntelliJ", "switched_from": "", "story": "Emacs Turns 50"}, {"id": 804617364, "item_id": 50288585, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50288585", "by": "wilkystyle", "date": "2026-10-29", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "IntelliJ's idea Vim plugin is a pretty decent one", "excerpt": "(not the person you are replying to) I am primarily an Emacs user, using the standard key bindings (and a whole bunch of custom bindings and functions I've built on top of it over the decades, ctrl remaped to caps lock and no Emacs pinky so far). But I am also 80% a NeoVim and Vim user for about 15 years now, and I consider myself quite proficient with Vim keybindings. The Emacs emulation is truly incredible, but the", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Emacs Turns 50"}, {"id": 777436323, "item_id": 48589770, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48589770", "by": "iLemming", "date": "2026-06-18", "stance": "warn", "quote": "not Sublime, not IntelliJ with IdeaVim have ever fully implemented vim motions to the degree where it doesn't feel foreign", "excerpt": "I'm a die-hard vimmer. I use vim-motions everywhere - they permeate my editors/IDEs, browsers, terminal, I use them system wide (e.g. to change volume or control media or my WM). One day I woke up with the realization of the fundamental truth - Emacs simply vims better. Much better than even Neovim. I just had to master Vim and grok some Lisp to arrive to that conclusion. People fighting Vim vs. Emacs are materially ", "context": "", "use_case": "Vim emulation", "switched_from": "", "story": "Emacs 31 Is Around the Corner: The Changes I'm Daily Driving"}, {"id": 770979313, "item_id": 48186207, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48186207", "by": "efortis", "date": "2026-05-18", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "if you use IdeaVim you can", "excerpt": "> I cannot instantly create a new file Agreed, but if you use IdeaVim you can: :e src/my_new_file.txt > The startup times are just abysmal For quick edits I just use Vim, but disabling unused plugins speeds up startup quiet a bit. -- > Switching projects has abysmal performance I reported that bug: https://youtrack.jetbrains.com/issue/JUNIE-2563/Minor-UX-Slow-teardown", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "No More JetBrains Products for Me"}, {"id": 768026210, "item_id": 48001638, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48001638", "by": "jbvlkt", "date": "2026-05-03", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I use ideavim with configuration as close as possible to astronvim", "excerpt": "I have just combined those together. I use astronvim as main editor but when I need IDE I switch to Idea. I use ideavim with configuration as close as possible to astronvim. So text editing is the same for me in both programs. Modal editors are still great and they can do a lot of work that looks like magic for AI era trained developers.", "context": "", "use_case": "Vim keybindings in IDE", "switched_from": "", "story": "Why TUIs Are Back"}, {"id": 736999408, "item_id": 46062463, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46062463", "by": "wiseowise", "date": "2025-11-26", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "", "excerpt": "Modal editing is unintuitive for the same reason why new language you're learning unintuitive. Once you understand the rules, it is much more intuitive than any other editor. This is the reason why I use IdeaVim/VSCodeVim instead of learning \"native\" shortcuts. Obligatory: https://i.imgur.com/WLzeQMj.png", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Surprisingly, Emacs on Android is pretty good"}, {"id": 735375681, "item_id": 45960980, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45960980", "by": "t_mahmood", "date": "2025-11-17", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "IdeaVIM makes IntelliJ more useful for me.", "excerpt": "No issues here, except for you being an Emacs user :D > IntelliJ is to blame for why my transition to Emacs took me two years ... It was a bit opposite for me, I jumped around so many editors, and, then I fell in love with VIM, spent so many hours to get the config that meets my need, dissed many Emac users. And, now after many years, as I grew, I realized, these are tools, and at the end, it's all on the user who ma", "context": "", "use_case": "Vim keybindings in IntelliJ", "switched_from": "", "story": "IDEmacs: A Visual Studio Code clone for Emacs"}, {"id": 735172805, "item_id": 45948300, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45948300", "by": "iLemming", "date": "2025-11-16", "stance": "warn", "quote": "IdeaVIM is good enough, but only to the point", "excerpt": "IntelliJ is an amazing feat of software engineering, there's no denying that. I'm not saying that to make you (or any other WebStorm/Pycharm/etc. user) feel better - I know that from years of dedicated use. I just want to share my anecdotal, personal story. I used IntelliJ professionally for almost a decade. I learned some advanced and undocumented features. I've collaborated with Jetbrains team members to help impro", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "IDEmacs: A Visual Studio Code clone for Emacs"}, {"id": 735155941, "item_id": 45947246, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45947246", "by": "t_mahmood", "date": "2025-11-16", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "IntelliJ shines when you use the command pallet, keyboard shortcuts, and IdeaVIM", "excerpt": "IntelliJ shines when you use the command pallet, keyboard shortcuts, and IdeaVIM Double shift, to bring up the pallet, and start typing. Though it also have a ton of shortcuts, and shortcuts can be assigned for almost every command. Try this: https://plugins.jetbrains.com/plugin/9792-key-promoter-x/ Whenever you don't use keyboard shortcut for any action, this suggests you the available keyboard shortcut.", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "IDEmacs: A Visual Studio Code clone for Emacs"}, {"id": 734725650, "item_id": 45920353, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45920353", "by": "arjie", "date": "2025-11-13", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "still use my IntelliJ + IdeaVim with Claude Code and Codex in a separate terminal in Ghostty", "excerpt": "I use Zed instead of my normal text editor because it opens instantaneously. But I don't write code in it, and still use my IntelliJ + IdeaVim with Claude Code and Codex in a separate terminal in Ghostty. But Zed is an insanely fast text editor to open text files in. Just double click and it's on the screen. Love that. Maybe over time I'll do more in it.", "context": "", "use_case": "Vim keybindings in IntelliJ", "switched_from": "", "story": "Zed is our office"}]}