My Favorite VS Code Shortcuts for macOS

Visual Studio Code (VS Code) has become my go-to code editor due to its versatility, extensive extension ecosystem, and intuitive interface. Over time, I have explored various features and discovered that mastering keyboard shortcuts significantly boosts my productivity.

I have used VS Code with different operating systems but primarily on macOS. While the editor allows for customizing key bindings, I prefer to stick to the default shortcuts as they are well-thought-out and efficient.

In this post, I want to share a curated list of my favorite VS Code shortcuts — the ones I rely on every day. Whether you’re a beginner aiming to streamline your workflow or an experienced developer looking to pick up a few new tricks, I hope you’ll find this collection useful.

Basic Editing

• ⌘A — Select all
• ⌘X — Cut
• ⌘C — Copy
• ⌘V — Paste
• ⌘Z — Undo
• ⌘⇧Z — Redo

File and Navigation

• ⌘P — Open file by search
• ⌘K ⌘W — Close all tabs

Sidebar and Panels

• ⌘B — Toggle sidebar
• ⌘⌥B — Toggle secondary sidebar
• ⌘J — Toggle bottom panel
• ⌘⌃→ — Move focus to right editor group
• ⌘⌃← — Move focus to left editor group
• ⌘⌥→ - Move focus to next editor group
• ⌘⌥← - Move focus to previous editor group

Command Palette

• ⌘⇧P — Open command palette
• ⌘K ⌘S — Open keyboard shortcuts

Code Editing

• ⌘L — Select line
• ⌘D — Select next occurrence
• ⌘⇧L — Select all occurrences
• ⌘F — Search
• ⌘⇧F — Search in all files
• ⌘G — Go to next occurrence
• ⌘⇧G — Go to previous occurrence
• ⌘⇧K — Delete line
• ⌥⇧↑ — Duplicate line above
• ⌥⇧↓ — Duplicate line below
• ⌥↑ — Move line up
• ⌥↓ — Move line down

Multi-Cursor Editing

• ⌘⌥↑ — Add cursor above
• ⌘⌥↓ — Add cursor below

Scrolling and Cursor Movement

• ⌘↑ — Scroll up
• ⌘↓ — Scroll down
• ⌘→ — Move cursor to end of line
• ⌘← — Move cursor to start of line
• ⌥→ — Move cursor to end of word
• ⌥← — Move cursor to start of word

Selection

• ⌘⇧↑ — Select from cursor to start of file
• ⌘⇧↓ — Select from cursor to end of file
• ⌘⇧→ — Select from cursor to end of line
• ⌘⇧← — Select from cursor to start of line

Commenting

• ⌘K ⌘C — Comment a line or all selected lines
• ⌘K ⌘U — Uncomment a line or all selected lines