How do I make git use the editor of my choice for commits?

Question

I would prefer to write my commit messages in Vim, but git is opening them in Emacs.

How do I configure git to always use Vim? Note that I want to do this globally, not just for a single project.

Solution 1

If you want to set the editor only for Git, do either (you don’t need both):

• Set core.editor in your Git config: git config --global core.editor "vim"

OR

• Set the GIT_EDITOR environment variable: export GIT_EDITOR=vim

---

If you want to set the editor for Git and also other programs, set the standardized VISUAL and EDITOR environment variables*:

export VISUAL=vim
export EDITOR="$VISUAL"

NOTE: Setting both is not necessarily needed, but some programs may not use the more-correct VISUAL. See VISUAL vs. EDITOR.

---

Some editors require a --wait flag, or they will open a blank page. For example:

• Sublime Text (if correctly set up; or use the full path to the executable in place of subl):

  export VISUAL="subl --wait"

• VS Code (after adding the shell command):

  export VISUAL="code --wait"

Solution 2

Copy paste this:

git config --global core.editor "vim"

In case you'd like to know what you're doing. From man git-commit:

ENVIRONMENT AND CONFIGURATION VARIABLES

The editor used to edit the commit log message will be chosen from the GIT_EDITOR environment variable, the core.editor configuration variable, the VISUAL environment variable, or the EDITOR environment variable (in that order).

Solution 3

On Ubuntu and also Debian (thanks @MichielB) changing the default editor is also possible by running:

sudo update-alternatives --config editor

Which will prompt the following:

There are 4 choices for the alternative editor (providing /usr/bin/editor).

  Selection    Path                Priority   Status
------------------------------------------------------------
  0            /bin/nano            40        auto mode
  1            /bin/ed             -100       manual mode
  2            /bin/nano            40        manual mode
* 3            /usr/bin/vim.basic   30        manual mode
  4            /usr/bin/vim.tiny    10        manual mode

Press enter to keep the current choice[*], or type selection number: 

Solution 4

In windows 7, while adding the "Sublime" editor it was still giving me an error:

Aborting commit due to empty commit message.

Sublime was not able to keep the focus.

To fix this I opened the .gitconfig file in c:/users/username/ folder and added the following line with --wait option outside the single quotes.

[core]
      editor = 'F:/Program Files/Sublime Text 2/sublime_text.exe' --wait

Hope its helpful to somebody facing similar issue with Sublime.

Solution 5

In Windows 7, setting editor to Notepad++

• Open any text editor.
• Open this file: C:\Users\YOUR_USERNAME\.gitconfig
• Add this section to the bottom:

---

For 64 bit Notepad++ use:

[core]
    editor = 'C:/Program Files/Notepad++/notepad++.exe' -multiInst -notabbar

For 32 bit Notepad++ use:

[core]
    editor = 'C:/Program Files (x86)/Notepad++/notepad++.exe' -multiInst -notabbar

• Save and close the file.
• When you're committing with git, just write git commit and press Enter. It will pop open Notepad++.
• Write your commit message at the top of the file, and save and close the file. Done!

View more solutions

Comments

[Michael Burr]

"How to get git to go to vim for commit comments from the git-go?"

[Stevoisiak]

Related (possible duplicate): How can I set up an editor to work with Git on Windows?

[Shawn Eary]

What's wrong with EMACS (smile) ?

[armandino]

Btw, the above is true for CVS and SVN, and I guess other version controls.

[Ralph Sinsuat]

@armandino: Yes, the others might use VISUAL or EDITOR, but they certainly don't use GIT_EDITOR or core.editor.

[armandino]

Thanks for clarifying Mark. I meant the EDITOR variable. I believe the GIT_EDITOR (if defined) simply overrides it.

[brasskazoo]

Yep - svnbook.red-bean.com/en/1.1/ch07.html#svn-ch-7-sect-1.3.2 So in theory, if I'm using both svn and git, setting $VISUAL or $EDITOR would be the best solution to cover both by default!

[Boojum]

The EDITOR environment variable has the advantage that a number of other programs will respect it as well.

[Anonigan]

Note that git config --global would write to your personal (per-user) git configuration file. On Unices it is ~/.gitconfig. So this would configure it for all your repositories.

[JRG]

For the sake of completeness, core.editor means [core] editor = ... in the file

[Marco M.]

you can test you successfully changed it by trying to amend the last commit message. git commit --amend

[MichielB]

On Debian this also works, thanks! It defaults to pico - argh.

[icl7126]

finally someone who knows how to write it simple! Thanks. But you should mentioned, that in the path to notepad have to be used '/' or double backslash '\\', otherwise git will complain...

[ErikE]

You may need to add at least -multiInst as a parameter to notepad++ and possibly -notabbar. Do this if git doesn't seem to know when you've finished editing the file and either waits forever or not at all.

[ddavison]

Nice! Thanks Anmol, I was having that issue where it was committing on an empty message.

[Pablissimo]

If you're doing option #1 in Windows and have spaces in the path to the editor (say, if it's under Program Files) then whack single-quotes inside your double-quotes. e.g. "'C:/Program Files (x86)/Whatever/App.exe'" - obvious to some but it wasn't to me!

[Matej]

@givanse what do you mean?

[Rup]

I guess he means it's trivial by analogy to the vim answer ?

[Matej]

hmm no it isn't, but if you use something else than vim (such as textmate).

[Abramodj]

You should change your answer to git config --global core.editor "vim -w" to actually allow the user to write a commit message.

[Adam F]

Why would you want to use sublime for git commits?

[Anmol Saraf]

Any editor for git commit will mostly be used to add multiple lines of comments and Sublime is a programmer choice for various reason for many developers. People generally have a tendency to use one editor for most of their coding and other works. Sublime is just a personal choice, it can be any editor.

[Rory O'Kane]

@Abramodj -w is not necessary; -w {scriptout} saves all characters you type when editing to replay later. Perhaps you are confusing it with -f, which is necessary when calling the GUI version of Vim. That is, if you use mvim, then the editor you specify should be mvim -f rather than mvim.

[Josef]

to set the config on the commandline, I need double quotes inside single quotes like >git config --global core.editor '"C:/Program Files (x86)/Notepad++/notepad++.exe"'

[trungly]

textmate also has a "wait" option, so for me, it's this: git config --global core.editor "/usr/local/bin/mate -w"

[Nick Volynkin]

From Pro Git: "By default, Git uses whatever you’ve set as your default text editor ($VISUAL or $EDITOR) or else falls back to the vi editor to create and edit your commit and tag messages. " Isn't this order a reversal to what you're citing from man git-commit?

[Mahendran]

Somehow it's not delivering the text to git. I got 'Aborting commit due to empty commit message.' error.

[Mahendran]

I have used the first command to setup SL. cmd + S then cmd +W to close editor

[7stud]

@RoryO'Kane, Thanks for the -f tip for mvim(i.e. macvim)! Both -w and -W didn't work correctly for me. With -w I got Aborting commit due to empty commit message., and -W opened a vim welcome window.

[underscore_d]

Of course it works on Debian; it's a Debian feature, which, like most things (ooh, controversial!), Ubuntu merely inherits. Debian's alternatives system is a much easier way to manage defaults for the supported program types. For reference: debian-administration.org/article/91/…

[Manza]

still opens the normal notepad for me

[kukinsula]

Here's how to set emacs in terminal mode when comiting git config --global core.editor "emacs -nw"

[mwfearnley]

Instead of going to File->Save as, you could blank the file (or comment out any non-blank lines), and then Git will abort due to an empty commit message.

[Shinigami]

--remote-wait-silent to avoid ugly error message :)

[Technext]

@ErikE: Thanks man! Both -multiInst and -notabbar were required. This was bugging for the last few hours.

[Ninja]

It works, while GIT_EDITOR and EDITOR not work --ubuntu

[Klaas]

If TextWrangler is already open your solution will open another instance with the same file set of the first one. This seems dangerous.

[Klaas]

I did install the TextWrangler command line tools (barebones.com/support/textwrangler/cmd-line-tools.html) and then used git config --global core.editor "edit -w". This will open the commit message in the current instance and as soon as you close only this commit message document, the commit will continue.

[SourceSeeker]

@haziz: On my system, one of the listed options is Emacs (others include various versions of Vim, plus nano and ed).

[Mikko Rantalainen]

If you have both core.editor and GIT_EDITOR set, GIT_EDITOR will be used. This is nice for setting default via git config and overriding the config for individual commands if needed. For example, I just needed $ GIT_EDITOR=nano git rebase -i origin/master because my X was not available to use my regular editor.

[cropredy]

To add the Notepadd++ params, I had to do this: editor = 'C:/Program Files (x86)/Notepad++/notepad++.exe' -multiInst -notabbar - that is, params outside the delimiting single quotes

[yaitloutou]

for sublime text 3: git config --global core.editor "subl -n -w" ~

[Stevoisiak]

For Windows users, you can use Notepad with git config --global core.editor "notepad"

[Automatico]

Visual Studio Code also support the -w parameter. Eg. $ git config --global core.editor "code -w". Neat stuff

[Andrew Ward]

ISSUE: On a mac , configured with "core.editor=mvim --nofork --remote-wait", I find that if I have OTHER vim windows open, unrelated to the git update/session, the --remote-wait requires ALL of them to be closed before git recognizes it's editor session as completed. Need to make the --remote-wait ONLY apply to the single window launched for that git editor session. Any suggestions?

[Gabriel Staples]

I just posted a more thorough Sublime Text answer here: stackoverflow.com/a/48212377/4561887. Thanks for your answer on it to get me started!

[Gabriel Staples]

Alternate answer here: stackoverflow.com/a/48212377/4561887, with Linux example.

[VonC]

That looks quite detailed. +1

[Radon8472]

better you add the line like this core.editor = 'notepad' .git/COMMIT_EDITMSG --wait so it opens and saves the default edit message and you dont need "save as"

[yegeniy]

In Sublime Text 3, there is now a Git Commit syntax type. You can skip the custom "sublime-text project" step now.

[Gabriel Staples]

I disagree: that does syntax highlighting only. My custom project doesn't touch syntax higlighting: it sets rulers and gives a context for your git commits to open up in so they don't open up in whatever project you have or last had open. The two are unrelated; do them both.

[Gabriel Staples]

I just added step 2.5, BUT (bit "but" here): I don't always use Sublime Text 3 as my editor (sometimes I use Eclipse since it has far superior symbol tracking and indexing than Sublime even though it's otherwise a crappy editor compared to Sublime), and I really prefer to use Git from the command-line, so I most definitely do not recommend skipping Step 1 even if you install the "Git" package into Sublime as I've described in Step 2.5 just now. Yes you can do Git Commits straight from Sublime but I'd prefer the command line.

[KayakinKoder]

If you're having an issue setting up Sublime (or any installed editor, really) often supplying the full path fixes the issue: git config --global core.editor "'C:/Program Files/Sublime Text 3/subl.exe' --wait"

[KayakinKoder]

Instead of editing gitconfig manually you can use this command git config --global core.editor "'C:/Program Files/Sublime Text 3/subl.exe' --wait"

[Major]

@haziz update-alternatives will show any editors that have been installed. Koen just doesn't have Emacs installed.

[Timo]

TIP: If you use sublime with git and also use trim_trailing_white_space_on_save you want to add an alias for patch adding because removing trailing white space breaks patch edits where it's very much meaningful. This can be achieved with something like this: git config --global alias.patch "-c core.editor=vim add --patch"

[miguelmorin]

I use git config --global core.editor "emacs -nw -q", where the -q skips initialization files.

[XPlatformer]

without the quotes, you'd need a lot of escaping: [core] editor = c:/Program\\ Files\\ \(x86\)/Vim/vim81/vim.exe

[benichka]

Thanks, I was struggling with the fact that just "vim" launched the "internal" vim instance for Git (without my preferences, etc.). Providing the full path to my instance solved the issue!

[Alexis Wilke]

When I install vim-gtk3 on my Ununtu 16.04 (and I suspect 18.04), the default is automatically switched to vim, until then I have nano as the default. So I think that may be why some people never need to run this command and it works as expected.

[EA304GT]

Works in *buntu18.04LTS

[Tom Hale]

It's best to set $EDITOR to vim -e to be pedantically safe.

[Bar Horing]

VSCode users: git config --global core.editor "code --wait"

[alper]

How could I set editor for git merge ? Does the core editor cover that as well?

[Pathros]

git config --global core.editor "vim" worked for me in Laravel Homestead