Features

This should be a standard, fully-featured Neovim GUI. Beyond that there are some visual niceties listed below :)

Ligatures

Supports ligatures and font shaping.

Animated Cursor

Cursor animates into position with a smear effect to improve tracking of cursor position.

Smooth Scrolling

Scroll operations on buffers in neovim will be animated smoothly pixel wise rather than line by line at a time.

Animated Windows

Windows animate into position when they are moved making it easier to see how layout changes happen.

Blurred Floating Windows

The backgrounds of floating windows are blurred improving the visual separation between foreground and background from built in window transparency.

Emoji Support

Font fallback supports rendering of emoji not contained in the configured font.

WSL Support

Neovide supports displaying a full gui window from inside wsl via the --wsl command argument. Communication is passed via standard io into the wsl copy of neovim providing identical experience similar to Visual Studio Code's Remote Editing.

Connecting to an existing Neovim instance

Neovide supports connecting to an already running instance of Neovim through the following communication channels:

• TCP
• Unix domain sockets (Unix-like platforms only)
• Named pipes (Windows only)

This is enabled by specifying the --server <address> command line argument. The address is interpreted as a TCP/IPv4/IPv6 address if it contains a colon :. Otherwise, it's interpreted as a Unix domain socket path on Unix-like systems and as the name of a pipe on Windows systems.

It's possible to quit the GUI while leaving the Neovim instance running by closing the Neovide application window instead of issuing a :q command.

One use case is to attach a GUI running on a local machine to a Neovim instance on a remote machine over the network.

TCP Example

Note that exposing Neovim over TCP, even on localhost, is inherently less secure than using Unix Domain Sockets.

Launch Neovim as a TCP server (on port 6666) by running:

nvim --headless --listen localhost:6666

And then connect to it using:

/path/to/neovide --server=localhost:6666

By specifying to listen on localhost, you only allow connections from your local computer. If you are actually doing this over a network you will want to use SSH port forwarding for security, and then connect as before.

ssh -L 6666:localhost:6666 ip.of.other.machine nvim --headless --listen localhost:6666

Unix Domain Socket Example

Launch a Neovim instance listening on a Unix Domain Socket:

nvim --headless --listen some-existing-dir/my-nvim-instance.sock

And then connect to it using:

/path/to/neovide --server=some-existing-dir/my-nvim-instance.sock

Like TCP sockets, Unix Domain Sockets can be forwarded over SSH. Start a Neovim instance on another host with:

ssh -L /path/to/local/socket:/path/to/remote/socket ip.of.other.machine \
    nvim --headless --listen /path/to/remote/socket

Then connect with:

/path/to/neovide --server=/path/to/local/socket

Windows Named Pipes Example

Launch a Neovim instances listening on a Named Pipe:

nvim --headless --listen //./pipe/some-known-pipe-name/with-optional-path

And then connect to it using:

/path/to/neovide --server=some-known-pipe-name/with-optional-path

Note: the pipe name passed to nvim must be prefixed with //./pipe/ but the server argument to Neovide will add it if it is missing.

Some Nonsense ;)

To learn how to configure the following, head on over to the configuration section!

Railgun

Torpedo

Pixiedust

Sonic Boom

Ripple

Wireframe

Installation

Note: Neovide requires neovim version 0.6 or greater. See previous releases such as 0.5.0 if your distro is too slow with updating or you need to rely on older neovim versions.

Building instructions are somewhat limited at the moment. All the libraries Neovide uses are cross platform and should have support for Windows, Mac, and Linux. The rendering is based on OpenGL, so a good GPU driver will be necessary, the default drivers provided by virtual machines might not be enough. On Windows this should be enabled by default if you have a relatively recent system.

Binaries

Installing should be as simple as downloading the binary, making sure the nvim executable with version 0.6 or greater is on your PATH environment variable, and running it. Everything should be self contained.

The binaries are to be found on the release page.

Windows

Scoop

Scoop has Neovide in the extras bucket. Ensure you have the extras bucket, and install:

$ scoop bucket list
main
extras

$ scoop install neovide

Windows Source

1. Install the latest version of Rust. I recommend https://rustup.rs/

2. Install CMake. I use chocolatey: choco install cmake --installargs '"ADD_CMAKE_TO_PATH=System"' -y

3. Install LLVM. I use chocolatey: choco install llvm -y

4. Ensure graphics libraries are up to date.

5. Build and install Neovide:

   cargo install --git https://github.com/neovide/neovide.git
   

   The resulting binary can be found inside of ~/.cargo/bin afterwards (99% of the time).

Mac

Homebrew

Neovide is available as Cask in Homebrew. It can be installed from the command line:

brew install --cask neovide

Neovide registers launched shells taking the user's preferred shell into account.

If you are encountering issues with Neovide not being found by your shell, you can try to add the brew binary path to your PATH environment variable:

sudo launchctl config user path "$(brew --prefix)/bin:${PATH}"

For more information, see the Homebrew FAQ.

Mac Source

1. Install the latest version of Rust. Using homebrew: brew install rustup-init

2. Configure rust by running rustup-init

3. Install CMake. Using homebrew: brew install cmake

4. git clone https://github.com/neovide/neovide

5. cd neovide

6. cargo install --path .

   The resulting binary is to be found under ~/.cargo/bin. In case you want a nice application bundle:

7. cargo install cargo-bundle

8. cargo bundle --release

9. cp -r ./target/release/bundle/osx/Neovide.app /Applications/Neovide.app and enjoy.

Linux

Arch Linux

Stable releases are packaged in the extra repository.

pacman -S neovide

If you want to run Neovide on X11, you'll also need libxkbcommon-x11.

pacman -S libxkbcommon-x11

To run a development version you can build from the VCS package in the AUR. This can be built and installed using an AUR helper or by hand in the usual way. To build from a non-default branch you can edit the PKGBUILD and add #branch-name to the end of the source URL.

Nix

Stable releases are packaged in nixpkgs in the neovide package, there's no flake. As such, if you just want to try it out in a transient shell, you can use this command.

Note: On non-NixOS systems, chances are you'll need to use nixGL as wrapper for neovide.

nix-shell -p neovide

NixOS

Just add neovide from nixpkgs to your environment.systemPackages in configuration.nix.

environment.systemPackages = with pkgs; [neovide];

Snap

Neovide is also available in the Snap Store. You can install it using the command below.

snap install neovide

Linux Source

1. Install necessary dependencies (adjust for your preferred package manager, probably most of this stuff is already installed, just try building and see)

   • Ubuntu/Debian

     sudo apt install -y curl \
         gnupg ca-certificates git \
         gcc-multilib g++-multilib cmake libssl-dev pkg-config \
         libfreetype6-dev libasound2-dev libexpat1-dev libxcb-composite0-dev \
         libbz2-dev libsndio-dev freeglut3-dev libxmu-dev libxi-dev libfontconfig1-dev \
         libxcursor-dev
     

   • Fedora

     sudo dnf install fontconfig-devel freetype-devel libX11-xcb libX11-devel libstdc++-static libstdc++-devel
     sudo dnf groupinstall "Development Tools" "Development Libraries"
     

   • Arch

     Do note that an AUR package already exists.

     sudo pacman -S base-devel fontconfig freetype2 libglvnd sndio cmake \
         git gtk3 python sdl2 vulkan-intel libxkbcommon-x11
     

2. Install Rust

   curl --proto '=https' --tlsv1.2 -sSf "https://sh.rustup.rs" | sh
   

3. Fetch and build

   cargo install --git https://github.com/neovide/neovide
   

   The resulting binary can be found inside of ~/.cargo/bin afterwards, you might want to add this to your PATH environment variable.

Configuration

Global Vim Settings

Neovide supports settings via global variables with a neovide prefix. They enable configuring many parts of the editor and support dynamically changing them at runtime.

init.vim and init.lua helpers

Hello, is this Neovide?

Not really a configuration option, but g:neovide only exists and is set to v:true if this Neovim is in Neovide. Useful for configuring things only for Neovide in your init.vim/init.lua:

VimScript:

if exists("g:neovide")
    " Put anything you want to happen only in Neovide here
endif

Lua:

if vim.g.neovide then
    -- Put anything you want to happen only in Neovide here
end

Display

Font

VimScript:

set guifont=Source\ Code\ Pro:h14

Lua:

vim.o.guifont = "Source Code Pro:h14" -- text below applies for VimScript

Controls the font used by Neovide. Also check the config file to see how to configure features. This is the only setting which is actually controlled through an option, and as such it's also documented in :h guifont. But to sum it up and also add Neovide's extension:

• The basic format is Primary\ Font,Fallback\ Font\ 1,Fallback\ Font\ 2:option1:option2:option3, while you can have as many fallback fonts as you want (even 0) and as many options as you want (also even 0).
• Fonts
  • are separated with , (commas).
  • can contain spaces by either escaping them or using _ (underscores).
• Options
  • apply to all fonts at once.
  • are separated from the fonts and themselves through : (colons).
  • can be one of the following:
    • hX — Sets the font size to X points, while X can be any (even floating-point) number.
    • wX (available since 0.11.2) — Sets the width relative offset to be X points, while X can be again any number. Negative values shift characters closer together, positive values shift them further apart.
    • b — Sets the font bold.
    • i — Sets the font italic.
    • #e-X (available since 0.10.2) — Sets edge pixels to be drawn opaquely or with partial transparency, while X is a type of edging:
      • antialias (default)
      • subpixelantialias
      • alias
    • #h-X (available since 0.10.2) - Sets level of glyph outline adjustment, while X is a type of hinting:
      • full (default)
      • normal
      • slight
      • none
• Some examples:
  • Hack,Noto_Color_Emoji:h12:b — Hack at size 12 in bold, with Noto Color Emoji as fallback should Hack fail to contain any glyph.
  • Roboto_Mono_Light:h10 — Roboto Mono Light at size 10.
  • Hack:h14:i:#e-subpixelantialias:#h-none

Line spacing

VimScript:

set linespace=0

Lua:

vim.opt.linespace = 0

Controls spacing between lines, may also be negative.

Scale

VimScript:

let g:neovide_scale_factor = 1.0

Lua:

vim.g.neovide_scale_factor = 1.0

Available since 0.10.2.

In addition to setting the font itself, this setting allows to change the scale without changing the whole font definition. Very useful for presentations. See the FAQ section about this for a nice recipe to bind this to a hotkey.

Padding

VimScript:

let g:neovide_padding_top = 0
let g:neovide_padding_bottom = 0
let g:neovide_padding_right = 0
let g:neovide_padding_left = 0

Lua:

vim.g.neovide_padding_top = 0
vim.g.neovide_padding_bottom = 0
vim.g.neovide_padding_right = 0
vim.g.neovide_padding_left = 0

Available since 0.10.4.

Controls the space between the window border and the actual Neovim, which is filled with the background color instead.

Background Color (Deprecated, Currently macOS only)

This configuration is deprecated now and might be removed in the future. In #2168, we have made Neovide control the title bar color itself. The color of title bar now honors neovide_transparency. If you want a transparent title bar, setting neovide_transparency is sufficient.

VimScript:

" g:neovide_transparency should be 0 if you want to unify transparency of content and title bar.
let g:neovide_transparency = 0.0
let g:transparency = 0.8
let g:neovide_background_color = '#0f1117'.printf('%x', float2nr(255 * g:transparency))

Lua:

-- Helper function for transparency formatting
local alpha = function()
  return string.format("%x", math.floor(255 * vim.g.transparency or 0.8))
end
-- g:neovide_transparency should be 0 if you want to unify transparency of content and title bar.
vim.g.neovide_transparency = 0.0
vim.g.transparency = 0.8
vim.g.neovide_background_color = "#0f1117" .. alpha()

Available since 0.10. Deprecated in 0.12.2.

Setting g:neovide_background_color to a value that can be parsed by csscolorparser-rs will set the color of the whole window to that value.

Note that g:neovide_transparency should be 0 if you want to unify transparency of content and title bar.

Window Blur (Currently macOS only)

VimScript:

let g:neovide_window_blurred = v:true

Lua:

vim.g.neovide_window_blurred = true

Available since 0.12.

Setting g:neovide_window_blurred toggles the window blur state.

The blurred level respects the g:neovide_transparency value between 0.0 and 1.0.

Floating Blur Amount

VimScript:

let g:neovide_floating_blur_amount_x = 2.0
let g:neovide_floating_blur_amount_y = 2.0

Lua:

vim.g.neovide_floating_blur_amount_x = 2.0
vim.g.neovide_floating_blur_amount_y = 2.0

Available since 0.9.

Setting g:neovide_floating_blur_amount_x and g:neovide_floating_blur_amount_y controls the blur radius on the respective axis for floating windows.

Floating Shadow

VimScript:

let g:neovide_floating_shadow = v:true
let g:neovide_floating_z_height = 10
let g:neovide_light_angle_degrees = 45
let g:neovide_light_radius = 5

Lua:

vim.g.neovide_floating_shadow = true
vim.g.neovide_floating_z_height = 10
vim.g.neovide_light_angle_degrees = 45
vim.g.neovide_light_radius = 5

Available since 0.12.0.

Setting g:neovide_floating_shadow to false will disable the shadow borders for floating windows. The other variables configure the shadow in various ways:

• g:neovide_floating_z_height sets the virtual height of the floating window from the ground plane
• g:neovide_light_angle_degrees sets the angle from the screen normal of the casting light
• g:neovide_light_radius sets the radius of the casting light

Transparency

VimScript:

let g:neovide_transparency = 0.8

Lua:

vim.g.neovide_transparency = 0.8

Setting g:neovide_transparency to a value between 0.0 and 1.0 will set the opacity of the window to that value.

Show Border (Currently macOS only)

VimScript:

let g:neovide_show_border = v:true

Lua:

vim.g.neovide_show_border = true

Draw a grey border around opaque windows only.

Default: false

Scroll Animation Length

VimScript:

let g:neovide_scroll_animation_length = 0.3

Lua:

vim.g.neovide_scroll_animation_length = 0.3

Sets how long the scroll animation takes to complete, measured in seconds. Note that the timing is not completely accurate and might depend slightly on have far you scroll, so experimenting is encouraged in order to tune it to your liking.

Far scroll lines

Available since 0.12.0.

VimScript:

let g:neovide_scroll_animation_far_lines = 1

Lua:

vim.g.neovide_scroll_animation_far_lines = 1

When scrolling more than one screen at a time, only this many lines at the end of the scroll action will be animated. Set it to 0 to snap to the final position without any animation, or to something big like 9999 to always scroll the whole screen, much like Neovide <= 0.10.4 did.

Hiding the mouse when typing

VimScript:

let g:neovide_hide_mouse_when_typing = v:false

Lua:

vim.g.neovide_hide_mouse_when_typing = false

By setting this to v:true, the mouse will be hidden as soon as you start typing. This setting only affects the mouse if it is currently within the bounds of the neovide window. Moving the mouse makes it visible again.

Underline automatic scaling

VimScript:

let g:neovide_underline_stroke_scale = 1.0

Lua:

vim.g.neovide_underline_stroke_scale = 1.0

Available since 0.12.0.

Setting g:neovide_underline_stroke_scale to a floating point will increase or decrease the stroke width of the underlines (including undercurl, underdash, etc.). If the scaled stroke width is less than 1, it is clamped to 1 to prevent strange aliasing.

Note: This is currently glitchy if the scale is too large, and leads to some underlines being clipped by the line of text below.

Theme

VimScript:

let g:neovide_theme = 'auto'

Lua:

vim.g.neovide_theme = 'auto'

Available since 0.11.0.

Set the background option when Neovide starts. Possible values: light, dark, auto. On systems that support it, auto will mirror the system theme, and will update background when the system theme changes.

Fix border and winbar scrolling glitches

VimScript:

let g:neovide_unlink_border_highlights = v:true

Lua:

vim.g.neovide_unlink_border_highlights = true

Available since 0.12.0.

Neovide uses some highlight groups for detecting the border of the windows, when scrolling. This detection is not perfect due to some limitations of Neovim, it only returns the final highlight groups for linked highlights. This option unlinks those highlight groups after the color scheme is loaded to make Neovide detect them properly.

If this causes other problems, you can set this option to false.

Functionality

Refresh Rate

VimScript:

let g:neovide_refresh_rate = 60

Lua:

vim.g.neovide_refresh_rate = 60

Setting g:neovide_refresh_rate to a positive integer will set the refresh rate of the app. This is limited by the refresh rate of your physical hardware, but can be lowered to increase battery life.

This setting is only effective when not using vsync, for example by passing --no-vsync on the commandline.

Idle Refresh Rate

VimScript:

let g:neovide_refresh_rate_idle = 5

Lua:

vim.g.neovide_refresh_rate_idle = 5

Available since 0.10.

Setting g:neovide_refresh_rate_idle to a positive integer will set the refresh rate of the app when it is not in focus.

This might not have an effect on every platform (e.g. Wayland).

No Idle

VimScript:

let g:neovide_no_idle = v:true

Lua:

vim.g.neovide_no_idle = true

Setting g:neovide_no_idle to a boolean value will force neovide to redraw all the time. This can be a quick hack if animations appear to stop too early.

Confirm Quit

VimScript:

let g:neovide_confirm_quit = v:true

Lua:

vim.g.neovide_confirm_quit = true

If set to true, quitting while having unsaved changes will require confirmation. Enabled by default.

Fullscreen

VimScript:

let g:neovide_fullscreen = v:true

Lua:

vim.g.neovide_fullscreen = true

Setting g:neovide_fullscreen to a boolean value will set whether the app should take up the entire screen. This uses the so called "windowed fullscreen" mode that is sometimes used in games which want quick window switching.

Remember Previous Window Size

VimScript:

let g:neovide_remember_window_size = v:true

Lua:

vim.g.neovide_remember_window_size = true

Setting g:neovide_remember_window_size to a boolean value will determine whether the window size from the previous session or the default size will be used on startup. The commandline option --size will take priority over this value.

Profiler

VimScript:

let g:neovide_profiler = v:false

Lua:

vim.g.neovide_profiler = false

Setting this to v:true enables the profiler, which shows a frametime graph in the upper left corner.

Input Settings

macOS Alt is Meta

VimScript:

let g:neovide_input_macos_alt_is_meta = v:false

Lua:

vim.g.neovide_input_macos_alt_is_meta = false

Available since 0.10.

Interprets Alt + whatever actually as <M-whatever>, instead of sending the actual special character to Neovim.

IME

VimScript:

let g:neovide_input_ime = v:true

Lua:

vim.g.neovide_input_ime = true

Available since 0.11.0.

This lets you disable the IME input. For example, to only enables IME in input mode and when searching, so that you can navigate normally, when typing some East Asian languages, you can add a few auto commands:

augroup ime_input
    autocmd!
    autocmd InsertLeave * execute "let g:neovide_input_ime=v:false"
    autocmd InsertEnter * execute "let g:neovide_input_ime=v:true"
    autocmd CmdlineEnter [/\?] execute "let g:neovide_input_ime=v:false"
    autocmd CmdlineLeave [/\?] execute "let g:neovide_input_ime=v:true"
augroup END

local function set_ime(args)
    if args.event:match("Enter$") then
        vim.g.neovide_input_ime = true
    else
        vim.g.neovide_input_ime = false
    end
end

local ime_input = vim.api.nvim_create_augroup("ime_input", { clear = true })

vim.api.nvim_create_autocmd({ "InsertEnter", "InsertLeave" }, {
    group = ime_input,
    pattern = "*",
    callback = set_ime
})

vim.api.nvim_create_autocmd({ "CmdlineEnter", "CmdlineLeave" }, {
    group = ime_input,
    pattern = "[/\\?]",
    callback = set_ime
})

Touch Deadzone

VimScript:

let g:neovide_touch_deadzone = 6.0

Lua:

vim.g.neovide_touch_deadzone = 6.0

Setting g:neovide_touch_deadzone to a value equal or higher than 0.0 will set how many pixels the finger must move away from the start position when tapping on the screen for the touch to be interpreted as a scroll gesture.

If the finger stayed in that area once lifted or the drag timeout happened, however, the touch will be interpreted as tap gesture and the cursor will move there.

A value lower than 0.0 will cause this feature to be disabled and all touch events will be interpreted as scroll gesture.

Touch Drag Timeout

VimScript:

let g:neovide_touch_drag_timeout = 0.17

Lua:

vim.g.neovide_touch_drag_timeout = 0.17

Setting g:neovide_touch_drag_timeout will affect how many seconds the cursor has to stay inside g:neovide_touch_deadzone in order to begin "dragging"

Once started, the finger can be moved to another position in order to form a visual selection. If this happens too often accidentally to you, set this to a higher value like 0.3 or 0.7.

Cursor Settings

Animation Length

VimScript:

let g:neovide_cursor_animation_length = 0.13

Lua:

vim.g.neovide_cursor_animation_length = 0.13

Setting g:neovide_cursor_animation_length determines the time it takes for the cursor to complete it's animation in seconds. Set to 0 to disable.

Animation Trail Size

VimScript:

let g:neovide_cursor_trail_size = 0.8

Lua:

vim.g.neovide_cursor_trail_size = 0.8

Setting g:neovide_cursor_trail_size determines how much the trail of the cursor lags behind the front edge.

Antialiasing

VimScript:

let g:neovide_cursor_antialiasing = v:true

Lua:

vim.g.neovide_cursor_antialiasing = true

Enables or disables antialiasing of the cursor quad. Disabling may fix some cursor visual issues.

Animate in insert mode

VimScript:

let g:neovide_cursor_animate_in_insert_mode = v:true

Lua:

vim.g.neovide_cursor_animate_in_insert_mode = true

If disabled, when in insert mode (mostly through i or a), the cursor will move like in other programs and immediately jump to its new position.

Animate switch to command line

VimScript:

let g:neovide_cursor_animate_command_line = v:true

Lua:

vim.g.neovide_cursor_animate_command_line = true

If disabled, the switch from editor window to command line is non-animated, and the cursor jumps between command line and editor window immediately. Does not influence animation inside of the command line.

Unfocused Outline Width

VimScript:

let g:neovide_cursor_unfocused_outline_width = 0.125

Lua:

vim.g.neovide_cursor_unfocused_outline_width = 0.125

Specify cursor outline width in ems. You probably want this to be a positive value less than 0.5. If the value is <=0 then the cursor will be invisible. This setting takes effect when the editor window is unfocused, at which time a block cursor will be rendered as an outline instead of as a full rectangle.

Animate cursor blink

VimScript:

let g:neovide_cursor_smooth_blink = v:false

Lua:

vim.g.neovide_cursor_smooth_blink = false

If enabled, the cursor will smoothly animate the transition between the cursor's on and off state. The built in guicursor neovim option needs to be configured to enable blinking by having a value set for both blinkoff, blinkon and blinkwait for this setting to apply.

Cursor Particles

There are a number of vfx modes you can enable which produce particles behind the cursor. These are enabled by setting g:neovide_cursor_vfx_mode to one of the following constants.

None at all

VimScript:

let g:neovide_cursor_vfx_mode = ""

Lua:

vim.g.neovide_cursor_vfx_mode = ""

The default, no particles at all.

Railgun

VimScript:

let g:neovide_cursor_vfx_mode = "railgun"

Lua:

vim.g.neovide_cursor_vfx_mode = "railgun"

Torpedo

VimScript:

let g:neovide_cursor_vfx_mode = "torpedo"

Lua:

vim.g.neovide_cursor_vfx_mode = "torpedo"

Pixiedust

VimScript:

let g:neovide_cursor_vfx_mode = "pixiedust"

Lua:

vim.g.neovide_cursor_vfx_mode = "pixiedust"

Sonic Boom

VimScript:

let g:neovide_cursor_vfx_mode = "sonicboom"

Lua:

vim.g.neovide_cursor_vfx_mode = "sonicboom"

Ripple

VimScript:

let g:neovide_cursor_vfx_mode = "ripple"

Lua:

vim.g.neovide_cursor_vfx_mode = "ripple"

Wireframe

VimScript:

let g:neovide_cursor_vfx_mode = "wireframe"

Lua:

vim.g.neovide_cursor_vfx_mode = "wireframe"

Particle Settings

Options for configuring the particle generation and behavior.

Particle Opacity

VimScript:

let g:neovide_cursor_vfx_opacity = 200.0

Lua:

vim.g.neovide_cursor_vfx_opacity = 200.0

Sets the transparency of the generated particles.

Particle Lifetime

VimScript:

let g:neovide_cursor_vfx_particle_lifetime = 1.2

Lua:

vim.g.neovide_cursor_vfx_particle_lifetime = 1.2

Sets the amount of time the generated particles should survive.

Particle Density

VimScript:

let g:neovide_cursor_vfx_particle_density = 7.0

Lua:

vim.g.neovide_cursor_vfx_particle_density = 7.0

Sets the number of generated particles.

Particle Speed

VimScript:

let g:neovide_cursor_vfx_particle_speed = 10.0

Lua:

vim.g.neovide_cursor_vfx_particle_speed = 10.0

Sets the speed of particle movement.

Particle Phase

VimScript:

let g:neovide_cursor_vfx_particle_phase = 1.5

Lua:

vim.g.neovide_cursor_vfx_particle_phase = 1.5

Only for the railgun vfx mode.

Sets the mass movement of particles, or how individual each one acts. The higher the value, the less particles rotate in accordance to each other, the lower, the more line-wise all particles become.

Particle Curl

VimScript:

let g:neovide_cursor_vfx_particle_curl = 1.0

Lua:

vim.g.neovide_cursor_vfx_particle_curl = 1.0

Only for the railgun vfx mode.

Sets the velocity rotation speed of particles. The higher, the less particles actually move and look more "nervous", the lower, the more it looks like a collapsing sine wave.

Commands

On startup, Neovide registers some commands for interacting with the os and platform window. These are neovim commands accessible via :{command name}.

Register/Unregister Right Click

On windows you can register a right click context menu item to edit a given file with Neovide. This can be done at any time by running the NeovideRegisterRightClick command. This can be undone with the NeovideUnregisterRightClick command.

Focus Window

Running the NeovideFocus command will bring the platform window containing Neovide to the front and activate it. This is useful for tools like neovim_remote which can manipulate neovim remotely or if long running tasks would like to activate the Neovide window after finishing.

Command Line Reference

Neovide supports a few command line arguments for effecting things which couldn't be set using normal vim variables.

$ in front of a word refers to it being an "environment variable" which is checked for, some settings only require it to be set in some way, some settings also use the contents.

Information

Version

--version or -V

Prints the current version of neovide.

Help

--help or -h

Prints details about neovide. This will be a help page eventually.

Functionality

Frame

--frame or $NEOVIDE_FRAME

Can be set to:

• full: The default, all decorations.
• none: No decorations at all. NOTE: Window cannot be moved nor resized after this.
• (macOS only) transparent: Transparent decorations including a transparent bar.
• (macOS only) buttonless: All decorations, but without quit, minimize or fullscreen buttons.

Window Size

--size=<width>x<height>

Sets the initial neovide window size in pixels.

Can not be used together with --maximized, or --grid.

Maximized

--maximized or $NEOVIDE_MAXIMIZED

Maximize the window on startup, while still having decorations and the status bar of your OS visible.

This is not the same as g:neovide_fullscreen, which runs Neovide in "exclusive fullscreen", covering up the entire screen.

Can not be used together with --size, or --grid.

Grid Size

--grid [<columns>x<lines>]

Available since 0.12.0.

Sets the initial grid size of the window. If no value is given, it defaults to columns/lines from init.vim/lua, see columns and lines.

If the --grid argument is not set then the grid size is inferred from the window size.

Note: After the initial size has been determined and init.vim/lua processed, you can set columns and lines inside neovim regardless of the command line arguments used. This has to be done before any redraws are made, so it's recommended to put it at the start of the init.vim/lua along with guifont and other related settings that can affect the geometry.

Can not be used together with --size, or --maximized.

Log File

--log

Enables the log file for debugging purposes. This will write a file next to the executable containing trace events which may help debug an issue.

Multigrid

--no-multigrid or $NEOVIDE_NO_MULTIGRID

This disables neovim's multigrid functionality which will also disable floating window blurred backgrounds, smooth scrolling, and window animations. This can solve some issues where neovide acts differently from terminal neovim.

No Fork

--no-fork or $NEOVIDE_FORK=0|1

By default, neovide detaches itself from the terminal. Instead of spawning a child process and leaking it, be "blocking" and have the shell directly as parent process.

No Idle

--no-idle or $NEOVIDE_IDLE=0|1

With idle on (default), neovide won't render new frames when nothing is happening.

With idle off (e.g. with --no-idle flag), neovide will constantly render new frames, even when nothing changed. This takes more power and CPU time, but can possibly help with frame timing issues.

Title (macOS Only)

--title-hidden or $NEOVIDE_TITLE_HIDDEN

Available since 0.12.2.

This sets the window title to be hidden on macOS.

sRGB

--no-srgb, --srgb or $NEOVIDE_SRGB=0|1

Request sRGB support on the window. Neovide does not actually render with sRGB, but it's still enabled by default on Windows to work around neovim/neovim/issues/907. Other platforms should not need it, but if you encounter either startup crashes or wrong colors, you can try to swap the option. The command line parameter takes priority over the environment variable.

Tabs

--no-tabs, --tabs or $NEOVIDE_TABS=0|1

By default, Neovide opens files given directly to Neovide (not NeoVim through --!) in multiple tabs to avoid confusing new users. --no-tabs disables this behavior.

Note: Even if files are opened in tabs, they're buffers anyways. It's just about them being visible or not.

No VSync

--no-vsync, --vsync or $NEOVIDE_VSYNC=0|1

Available since 0.10.2.

By default, Neovide requests to use VSync on the created window. --no-vsync disables this behavior. The command line parameter takes priority over the environment variable. If you don't enable vsync, then g:neovide_refresh_rate will be used.

Neovim Server

--server <ADDRESS>

Connects to the named pipe or socket at ADDRESS.

WSL

--wsl

Runs neovim from inside wsl rather than as a normal executable.

Neovim Binary

--neovim-bin or $NEOVIM_BIN

Sets where to find neovim's executable. If unset, neovide will try to find nvim on the PATH environment variable instead. If you're running a Unix-alike, be sure that binary has the executable permission bit set.

Wayland / X11

--wayland-app-id <wayland_app_id> or $NEOVIDE_APP_ID
--x11-wm-class-instance <x11_wm_class_instance> or $NEOVIDE_WM_CLASS_INSTANCE
--x11-wm-class <x11_wm_class> or $NEOVIDE_WM_CLASS

On Linux/Unix, this alters the identification of the window to either X11 or the more modern Wayland, depending on what you are running on.

Config File

Available since 0.11.0.

Neovide also support configuration through a config file in the toml format.

Settings priority

There are two types of settings:

1. Settings override these settings from the environment variables, but they can be overridden by command line arguments.
2. Runtime settings. These settings can be hot-reloaded in runtime.

Location

Available settings

Settings currently available in the config file with default values:

wsl = false
no-multigrid = false
vsync = true
maximized = false
srgb = false
idle = true
neovim-bin = "/usr/bin/nvim" # in reality found dynamically on $PATH if unset
frame = "full"
title-hidden = true
tabs = true

Settings from environment variables can be found in Command Line Reference, see that doc for details on what those settings do.

Runtime settings

Font

Available since 0.12.1.

[font] table in configuration file contains:

• normal: required, FontDescription
• bold: optional, SecondaryFontDescription
• italic: optional, SecondaryFontDescription
• bold_italic: optional, SecondaryFontDescription
• features: optional, { "<font>" = ["<string>"] }
• size: required,
• width: optional,
• allow_float_size: optional,
• hinting: optional,
• edging: optional,

Settings size, width, allow_float_size, hinting and edging can be found in Configuration.

• FontDescription can be:
  • a table with two keys family and style, family is required, style is optional,
  • a string, indicate the font family,
  • an array of string or tables in previous two forms.
• SecondaryFontDescription can be:
  • a table with two keys family and style, both are optional,
  • a string, indicate the font family,
  • an array of string or tables in previous two forms.
• Font styles consist of zero or more space separated parts, each parts can be:
  • pre-defined style name
    • weight: Thin, ExtraLight, Light, Normal, Medium, SemiBold, Bold, ExtraBold, Black, ExtraBlack
    • slant: Italic, Oblique
  • variable font weight: W<weight>, e.g. W100, W200, W300, W400, W500, W600, W700, W800, W900
• Font features are a table with font family as key and an array of string as value, each string is a font feature.
  • Font feature is a string with format +<feature>, -<feature> or <feature>=<value>, e.g. +ss01, -calt, ss02=2. +<feature> is a shorthand for <feature>=1, -<feature> is a shorthand for <feature>=0.

Example:

[font]
normal = ["MonoLisa Nerd Font"]
size = 18

[font.features]
MonoLisa = [ "+ss01", "+ss07", "+ss11", "-calt", "+ss09", "+ss02", "+ss14", "+ss16", "+ss17" ]

Editing w/ External Tools

You can use Neovide in other programs as editor, this page aims to document some quirks. Support for that, however, is only possible as far as reasonably debuggable.

Note: We do not endorse nor disrecommend usage of all programs listed here. All usage happens on your own responsibility.

jrnl

In your configuration file:

editor: "neovide --no-fork"

...as jrnl saves & removes the temporary file as soon as the main process exits, which happens before startup by forking.

Troubleshooting

• Should Neovide happen not to start at all, check the following:

  • Shell startup files if they output anything during startup, like neofetch or echo. Neovide uses your shell to find nvim and can't know the difference between output and nvim's path. You can use your resource file (in the case of zsh ~/.zshrc) instead for such commands.

  • Whether or not you can reproduce this by running from the latest git main commit. This can be done by running from source or just grabbing the binary from the Actions tab on GitHub.

• Neovide requires that a font be set in init.vim otherwise errors might be encountered. This can be fixed by adding set guifont=Your\ Font\ Name:h15 in init.vim file. Reference issue #527.

• If you installed neovim via Apple Silicon (M1)-based brew, you have to add the brew prefix to $PATH to run Neovide.app in GUI. Please see the homebrew documentation. Reference issue #1242

Linux

• If you receive errors complaining about DRI3 settings, please reference issue #44.

• If your scrolling is stuttering

  • Add flags --no-vsync and --no-idle before startup as a quickfix.

  • Check if the value of g:neovide_refresh_rate and the refresh rate of your monitor are matched.

  • If your g:neovide_refresh_rate is correct, then check if you are using dual monitors with mixed refresh rate, say 144 and 60, by checking output of xrandr (wayland should support mixed refresh rate out of the box), if so,that's because X11 does not support mixed refresh rate well. You may be able to fix this through your compositor or by switching to wayland. As a temporary work around, you may set g:neovide_refresh_rate to the lower value.

Performance Profiling

If you encounter a performance problem like frame rate stuttering, besides attaching a log file when reporting bugs, tracy profiling data will also be very useful and can usually help developers to troubleshoot the bug much faster. Here is how you can collect tracy data.

1. Install tracy. Windows users can download it at its GitHub release page. Linux and macOS users can install it with package manager. Otherwise, you may have to build it yourself following tracy docs.

2. Build a profiling version of Neovide. Follow the installation page to install all required dependencies and Rust SDK. Download or clone source code of Neovide. Build it with following commands. Note that you need to specify both --profile profiling and --features profiling, so that Neovide is built for a profiling version. Or, you can skip these commands, and let cargo run in step 5 build it automatically before running.

   cd [neovide-source-dir]
   cargo build --profile profiling --features profiling
   

3. Prepare tracy for collecting data. Start tracy with,

   tracy-capture -o [log-file-path]
   

   You will see output like this,

   Connecting to 127.0.0.1:8086...
   

   It means tracy begins to wait for Neovide and will capture profiling data once it starts.

4. Running Neovide and reproduce the performance issue. Start Neovide with following commands in another terminal. If you have built Neovide with commands in step 3, this should be very fast. If not, it will build Neovide first. You have to specify --profile profiling and --features profiling here, too.

   cd [neovide-source-dir]
   cargo run --profile profiling --features profiling -- --no-fork [neovide-arguments...]
   

   Now do whatever leads to performance issue in Neovide and exit.

5. Get the tracy data and report bugs with it. Turn to tracy, you will see output like,

   Saving trace... done!
   

   You will find tracy log file at the path you specified before. Attach it in your bug report! You can also view it yourself with tracy [log-file-path].

Frequently Asked Questions

Commonly asked questions, or just explanations/elaborations on stuff.

How can I use cmd-c/cmd-v to copy and paste?

Neovide doesn't add or remove any keybindings to neovim, it only forwards keys. Its likely that your terminal adds these keybindings, as neovim doesn't have them by default. We can replicate this behavior by adding keybindings in neovim.

if vim.g.neovide then
  vim.keymap.set('n', '<D-s>', ':w<CR>') -- Save
  vim.keymap.set('v', '<D-c>', '"+y') -- Copy
  vim.keymap.set('n', '<D-v>', '"+P') -- Paste normal mode
  vim.keymap.set('v', '<D-v>', '"+P') -- Paste visual mode
  vim.keymap.set('c', '<D-v>', '<C-R>+') -- Paste command mode
  vim.keymap.set('i', '<D-v>', '<ESC>l"+Pli') -- Paste insert mode
end

-- Allow clipboard copy paste in neovim
vim.api.nvim_set_keymap('', '<D-v>', '+p<CR>', { noremap = true, silent = true})
vim.api.nvim_set_keymap('!', '<D-v>', '<C-R>+', { noremap = true, silent = true})
vim.api.nvim_set_keymap('t', '<D-v>', '<C-R>+', { noremap = true, silent = true})
vim.api.nvim_set_keymap('v', '<D-v>', '<C-R>+', { noremap = true, silent = true})

How To Enable Floating And Popupmenu Transparency?

Those are controlled through the winblend and pumblend options. See their help pages for more, but for short: Both options can be values between 0 (opaque) and 100 (fully transparent), inclusively on both ends. winblend controls the background for floating windows, pumblend the one for the popup menu.

telescope.nvim is different here though. Instead of using the global winblend option, it has its own telescope.defaults.winblend configuration option, see this comment in #1626.

How Can I Dynamically Change The Scale At Runtime?

Neovide offers the setting g:neovide_scale_factor, which is multiplied with the OS scale factor and the font size. So using this could look like

VimScript:

let g:neovide_scale_factor=1.0
function! ChangeScaleFactor(delta)
  let g:neovide_scale_factor = g:neovide_scale_factor * a:delta
endfunction
nnoremap <expr><C-=> ChangeScaleFactor(1.25)
nnoremap <expr><C--> ChangeScaleFactor(1/1.25)

Lua:

vim.g.neovide_scale_factor = 1.0
local change_scale_factor = function(delta)
  vim.g.neovide_scale_factor = vim.g.neovide_scale_factor * delta
end
vim.keymap.set("n", "<C-=>", function()
  change_scale_factor(1.25)
end)
vim.keymap.set("n", "<C-->", function()
  change_scale_factor(1/1.25)
end)

Credits to BHatGuy here.

How can I Dynamically Change The Transparency At Runtime? (macOS)

VimScript:

" Set transparency and background color (title bar color)
let g:neovide_transparency=0.0
let g:neovide_transparency_point=0.8
let g:neovide_background_color = '#0f1117'.printf('%x', float2nr(255 * g:neovide_transparency_point))

" Add keybinds to change transparency
function! ChangeTransparency(delta)
  let g:neovide_transparency_point = g:neovide_transparency_point + a:delta
  let g:neovide_background_color = '#0f1117'.printf('%x', float2nr(255 * g:neovide_transparency_point))
endfunction
noremap <expr><D-]> ChangeTransparency(0.01)
noremap <expr><D-[> ChangeTransparency(-0.01)

Lua:

-- Helper function for transparency formatting
local alpha = function()
  return string.format("%x", math.floor(255 * vim.g.neovide_transparency_point or 0.8))
end
-- Set transparency and background color (title bar color)
vim.g.neovide_transparency = 0.0
vim.g.neovide_transparency_point = 0.8
vim.g.neovide_background_color = "#0f1117" .. alpha()
-- Add keybinds to change transparency
local change_transparency = function(delta)
  vim.g.neovide_transparency_point = vim.g.neovide_transparency_point + delta
  vim.g.neovide_background_color = "#0f1117" .. alpha()
end
vim.keymap.set({ "n", "v", "o" }, "<D-]>", function()
  change_transparency(0.01)
end)
vim.keymap.set({ "n", "v", "o" }, "<D-[>", function()
  change_transparency(-0.01)
end)

Neovide Is Not Picking Up Some Shell-configured Information

...aka nvm use doesn't work, aka anything configured in ~/.bashrc/~/.zshrc is ignored by Neovide.

Neovide doesn't start the embedded neovim instance in an interactive shell, so your shell doesn't read part of its startup file (~/.bashrc/~/.zshrc/whatever the equivalent for your shell is). But depending on your shell there are other options for doing so, for example for zsh you can just put your relevant content into ~/.zprofile or ~/.zlogin.

The Terminal Displays Fallback Colors/:terminal Does Not Show My Colors

Your colorscheme has to define g:terminal_color_0 through g:terminal_color_15 in order to have any effect on the terminal. Just setting any random highlights which have Term in name won't help.

Some colorschemes think of this, some don't. Search in the documentation of yours, if it's your own, add it, and if you can't seem to find anything, open an issue in the colorscheme's repo.

Compose key sequences do not work

One possible cause might be inconsistent capitalization of your locale settings, see #1896. Possibly you're also running an outdated version of Neovide.

Another possible cause is that you are using IME on X11. Dead keys with IME is not yet supported, but you can work around that either by disabling IME or configuring it to only be enabled in insert mode. See Configuration.

Font size is weird with high dpi display on x11

Winit looks in multiple locations for the configured dpi. Make sure its set in at least one of them. More details here: #2010.

Maintainer Cookbook

General notes about collaborating/doing maintenance work on Neovide.

How to keep your sanity

• Don't think you need to solve, participate in or even notice everything happening.

  Work on such a project where most things are already done and the things left aren't that fun anymore can be very gruesome, even if that might not be directly noticeable. Just do whatever is fun, feels doable and is inspiring you. This is not a full-time job, it's not even a job at all. You're not required to answer if you don't feel like doing so or would be forcing yourself.

  In short: Do whatever you seriously want.

• Always assume the best. There's no reason to be rude.

  Communication is hard. Even if it might seem like someone seriously didn't take any look at the docs before opening the issue, it's very possible that they did and found it not to be matching their case, misinterpreted what's written, or weren't sure if they were looking at the right section. What might feel obvious to you could feel obscure to another person.

  Re-state the essential docs contents, link to the relevant section and ask how it could be worded better/could be found better.

• Ask for more information if you require so. Some investigation can be done by the user.

  If some case requires some special environmental information which isn't given in the original report, ask for it. Or if you aren't sure what you're looking for, state what you believe is the case and add some potentially useful queries. It's also completely okay to state afterwards that you still don't have a clue.

  Neovide is a frontend for an arcane text editor, it's very possible that the person reporting the issue has some Rust or general programming knowledge and could help with debugging/tracing down the original cause for an issue. Some people state so if they want to do that (usually by "I'd be happy for any pointers or hints" or "I'm interested in contributing"), but this is more art than science. Even if the original reporter can't seem to solve the issue, someone else interested in contributing might lurk around and find exactly those pointers.

How to release

Note: These are not a strict rulebook, but rather one possible way for releasing. Adjust as you see fit (and then update here with your findings).

Preparing

1. Head over to the releases page and hit the Draft a new release button.
2. Keep the resulting page somewhere safe open, you'll need to work with it the next half an hour and GitHub doesn't automatically save its contents.
3. Create a new tag with an appropriate version number.

We're not fully following SemVer here, but as of 0.10.1 larger changes should be an increase in the MINOR part, while fixups should be an increase in the PATCH part.

1. Hit the Generate release notes button.

2. Reformat to be similar to previous releases

   • Rename the What's Changed section to Changes
   • Rewrite each line in the Changes section to reflect what this change means for the end user, linking to the relevant PR/commit
   • Group all bug fix PRs/commits under a point named Bug fixes
   • Have each line reflect what platform it applies to if not irrelevant

3. Hit the Save draft button

You can make several rounds of preparing such releases through editing the current draft over time, to make sure every contributor is mentioned and every change is included.

Actually releasing

1. Announce a short period of time where last changes to be done or fixup work can flow in (can be anything you imagine, though 24 hours to one week might be enough depending on the blocker)
2. Wait for that period to pass
3. Have a last look over the draft to make sure every new contributor and change has been mentioned

Now here's where the order becomes important:

1. Make sure the working directory is clean

2. Run cargo update and cargo build, make sure both succeed

3. Create a commit named Run cargo update or similar

4. Bump the version to match the tag name everywhere

   • Cargo.toml (do note it contains the version twice, one time in the top, one time at the bottom in the bundling section)
   • snap/snapcraft.yaml
   • website/docs/*.md and update Unreleased yet to Available since $tag (where $tag is the tag name)

5. Run cargo build and make sure it succeeds, remember to git add Cargo.lock to make sure releases stay reproducible (#1628, #1482)

6. Create a commit called Bump version to $tag

7. Push and wait for CI to complete (will take around 25 minutes)

8. Run cargo build --frozen

In the meantime, you can look through the previous commits to see if you missed anything.

1. From the Bump version to $tag commit, download all the artifacts

2. Unzip

   • neovide.AppImage.zip
   • neovide.AppImage.zsync.zip
   • neovide.msi.zip
   • neovide-linux-x86_64.tar.gz.zip

3. Head to the release draft, edit it and upload the produced artifacts (using the unzipped versions if listed above)

4. Hit Publish release

5. profit

Phew. Now, announce the new release anywhere you think is appropriate (like Reddit, Discord, whatever) and go create a PR in nixpkgs.