wezterm/docs/config/keys.markdown

Both the keyboard and the mouse bindings are configurable.

The assignments are based around a triggering event, such as a keypress or mouse button click, which is combined with a set of modifier keys to produce an action.

A full list of possible keys, mouse events and actions are included below, after these tables describing the default assignments.

Alt / Option Key Behavior & Composed Keys

The operating system has its own user selectable keymap that is sometimes at odds with old-school terminal emulation that pre-dates internationalization as a concept. WezTerm tries to behave reasonably by default, but also give you control in other situations.

Layouts with an AltGr key

If you have, for example, a European keyboard layout with an AltGr key then wezterm will respect the composition effects of AltGr produced by the system. For example, in a German keymap, AltGr < will produce |.

If your physical keyboard doesn't match the keyboard layout (eg: using a US keyboard with DEU selected in the OS), then the right hand Alt key is often re-interpreted as having the AltGr function with behavior as described above.

The left Alt will be treated as a modifier with no composition effects.

macOS Left and Right Option Key

since: 20200620-160318-e00b076c

The default behavior is to treat the left Option key as the Alt modifier with no composition effects, while the right Option key performs composition (making it approximately equivalent to AltGr on other operating systems).

You can control this behavior in your configuration:

return {
  send_composed_key_when_left_alt_is_pressed=false,
  send_composed_key_when_right_alt_is_pressed=true,
}

If you're running an earlier release the options were a bit more limited; both left and right Option keys behave identically and composition behavior was influenced for both of them via the send_composed_key_when_alt_is_pressed configuration option.

macOS and the Input Method Editor (IME)

WezTerm has support for using the operating system Input Method Editor (IME) on macOS. This is useful in cases where you need to type kanji. However, the input method editor can get in the way and has a couple of irritating side effects such as preventing key repeat for a subset of keys.

You can control whether the IME is enabled on macOS in your configuration file:

return {
  use_ime = false,
}

since: 20200620-160318-e00b076c

The default for use_ime is false. The default in earlier releases was true.

Defining Assignments for key combinations that may be composed

When a key combination produces a composed key result, wezterm will look up both the composed and uncomposed versions of the keypress in your key mappings. If either lookup matches your assignment, that will take precedence over the normal key processing.

Default Shortcut / Key Binding Assignments

The default key bindings are:

Modifiers	Key	Action
SUPER	c	Copy
SUPER	v	Paste
CTRL+SHIFT	c	Copy
CTRL+SHIFT	v	Paste
SHIFT	Insert	Paste
SUPER	m	Hide
SUPER	n	SpawnWindow
CTRL+SHIFT	n	SpawnWindow
ALT	Enter	ToggleFullScreen
SUPER	-	DecreaseFontSize
CTRL	-	DecreaseFontSize
SUPER	=	IncreaseFontSize
CTRL	=	IncreaseFontSize
SUPER	0	ResetFontSize
CTRL	0	ResetFontSize
SUPER	t	SpawnTab="CurrentPaneDomain"
CTRL+SHIFT	t	SpawnTab="CurrentPaneDomain"
SUPER+SHIFT	T	SpawnTab="DefaultDomain"
SUPER	w	CloseCurrentTab
SUPER	1	ActivateTab=0
SUPER	2	ActivateTab=1
SUPER	3	ActivateTab=2
SUPER	4	ActivateTab=3
SUPER	5	ActivateTab=4
SUPER	6	ActivateTab=5
SUPER	7	ActivateTab=6
SUPER	8	ActivateTab=7
SUPER	9	ActivateTab=-1
CTRL+SHIFT	w	CloseCurrentTab
CTRL+SHIFT	1	ActivateTab=0
CTRL+SHIFT	2	ActivateTab=1
CTRL+SHIFT	3	ActivateTab=2
CTRL+SHIFT	4	ActivateTab=3
CTRL+SHIFT	5	ActivateTab=4
CTRL+SHIFT	6	ActivateTab=5
CTRL+SHIFT	7	ActivateTab=6
CTRL+SHIFT	8	ActivateTab=7
CTRL+SHIFT	9	ActivateTab=-1
SUPER+SHIFT	[	ActivateTabRelative=-1
SUPER+SHIFT	]	ActivateTabRelative=1
CTRL+SHIFT	PAGEUP	MoveTabRelative=-1
CTRL+SHIFT	PAGEDOWN	MoveTabRelative=1
SHIFT	PAGEUP	ScrollByPage=-1
SHIFT	PAGEDOWN	ScrollByPage=1
ALT	9	ShowTabNavigator
SUPER	r	ReloadConfiguration
CTRL+SHIFT	R	ReloadConfiguration
SUPER	h	HideApplication (macOS only)
SUPER	k	ClearScrollback
CTRL+SHIFT	K	ClearScrollback
SUPER	f	Search={CaseSensitiveString=""}
CTRL+SHIFT	F	Search={CaseSensitiveString=""}
CTRL+SHIFT	X	ActivateCopyMode

If you don't want the default assignments to be registered, you can disable all of them with this configuration; if you chose to do this, you must explicitly register every binding.

return {
  disable_default_key_bindings = true,
}

Default Mouse Assignments

In the table below, Triple Left Down means that the left mouse button is being triple clicked and that the event matches the downstroke of the third quick consecutive press. Triple Left Up matches the subsequent release event of that triple click, so for a triple click both SelectTextAtMouseCursor="Line" and CompleteSelection will be triggered in that order.

Event	Modifiers	Action
Triple Left Down	NONE	SelectTextAtMouseCursor="Line"
Double Left Down	NONE	SelectTextAtMouseCursor="Word"
Single Left Down	NONE	SelectTextAtMouseCursor="Cell"
Single Left Down	SHIFT	ExtendSelectionToMouseCursor={}
Single Left Up	NONE	CompleteSelectionOrOpenLinkAtMouseCursor
Double Left Up	NONE	CompleteSelection
Triple Left Up	NONE	CompleteSelection
Single Left Drag	NONE	ExtendSelectionToMouseCursor="Cell"
Double Left Drag	NONE	ExtendSelectionToMouseCursor="Word"
Triple Left Drag	NONE	ExtendSelectionToMouseCursor="Line"
Single Middle Down	NONE	Paste

If you don't want the default assignments to be registered, you can disable all of them with this configuration; if you chose to do this, you must explicitly register every binding.

return {
  disable_default_mouse_bindings = true,
}

Configuring Mouse Assignments

since: 20200607-144723-74889cd4

You can define mouse actions using the mouse_bindings configuration section:

local wezterm = require 'wezterm';

return {
  mouse_bindings = {
    -- Right click sends "woot" to the terminal
    {
      event={Down={streak=1, button="Right"}},
      mods="NONE",
      action=wezterm.action{SendString="woot"}
    },

    -- Change the default click behavior so that it only selects
    -- text and doesn't open hyperlinks
    {
      event={Up={streak=1, button="Left"}},
      mods="NONE",
      action="CompleteSelection",
    },

    -- and make CTRL-Click open hyperlinks
    {
      event={Up={streak=1, button="Left"}},
      mods="CTRL",
      action="OpenLinkAtMouseCursor",
    },
  },
}

The action and mods portions are described in more detail in the key assignment information below.

The event portion has three components;

• Whether it is a Down, Up or Drag event
• The number of consecutive clicks within the click threshold (the click streak)
• The mouse button; Left, Right, or Middle.

A double click is a down-up-down sequence where either the second button down is held for long enough or is released and no subsequent down event occurs within the click threshold. When recognized, it emits a Down event with streak=2. If the mouse is moved while the button is held, a Drag event with streak=2 is generated. When the mouse button is released an Up event with streak=2 is generated.

The mouse event recognizer supports an arbitrary click streak, so if you wanted quadruple-click bindings you can specify streak=4.

Event	Lua Representation
Triple Left Down	event={Down={streak=3, button="Left"}}
Double Left Up	event={Up={streak=2, button="Left"}}
Single Left Drag	event={Drag={streak=1, button="Left"}}

Configuring Key Assignments

These can be overridden using the keys section in your ~/.wezterm.lua config file. For example, you can disable a default assignment like this:

local wezterm = require 'wezterm';

return {
  keys = {
    -- Turn off the default CMD-m Hide action on macOS by making it
    -- send the empty string instead of hiding the window
    {key="m", mods="CMD", action="Nop"}
  }
}

The key value can be one of the following keycode identifiers. Note that not all of these are meaningful on all platforms:

Hyper, Super, Meta, Cancel, Backspace, Tab, Clear, Enter, Shift, Escape, LeftShift, RightShift, Control, LeftControl, RightControl, Alt, LeftAlt, RightAlt, Menu, LeftMenu, RightMenu, Pause, CapsLock, PageUp, PageDown, End, Home, LeftArrow, RightArrow, UpArrow, DownArrow, Select, Print, Execute, PrintScreen, Insert, Delete, Help, LeftWindows, RightWindows, Applications, Sleep, Numpad0, Numpad1, Numpad2, Numpad3, Numpad4, Numpad5, Numpad6, Numpad7, Numpad8, Numpad9, Multiply, Add, Separator, Subtract, Decimal, Divide, NumLock, ScrollLock, BrowserBack, BrowserForward, BrowserRefresh, BrowserStop, BrowserSearch, BrowserFavorites, BrowserHome, VolumeMute, VolumeDown, VolumeUp, MediaNextTrack, MediaPrevTrack, MediaStop, MediaPlayPause, ApplicationLeftArrow, ApplicationRightArrow, ApplicationUpArrow, ApplicationDownArrow.

Alternatively, a single unicode character can be specified to indicate pressing the corresponding key.

Possible Modifier labels are:

• SUPER, CMD, WIN - these are all equivalent: on macOS the Command key, on Windows the Windows key, on Linux this can also be the Super or Hyper key. Left and right are equivalent.
• SHIFT - The shift key. Left and right are equivalent.
• ALT, OPT, META - these are all equivalent: on macOS the Option key, on other systems the Alt or Meta key. Left and right are equivalent.

You can combine modifiers using the | symbol (eg: "CMD|CTRL").

Possible Actions

Possible actions are listed below.

SpawnTab

Create a new tab in the current window. The argument defines to which domain the tab belongs:

local wezterm = require 'wezterm';
return {
  keys = {
    -- Create a new tab in the default domain
    {key="t", mods="SHIFT|ALT", action=wezterm.action{SpawnTab="DefaultDomain"}},
    -- Create a new tab in the same domain as the current tab
    {key="t", mods="SHIFT|ALT", action=wezterm.action{SpawnTab="CurrentPaneDomain"}},
    -- Create a tab in a named domain
    {key="t", mods="SHIFT|ALT", action=wezterm.action{SpawnTab={DomainName="unix"}}},
  }
}

SpawnWindow

Create a new window containing a tab from the default tab domain.

local wezterm = require 'wezterm';
return {
  keys = {
    {key="n", mods="SHIFT|CTRL", action="SpawnWindow"},
  }
}

SpawnCommandInNewWindow / SpawnCommandInNewTab

Spawn a new tab either into the current window or into a brand new window. The argument controls which command is run in the tab; it is a lua table with the following fields:

• args - the argument array specifying the command and its arguments. If omitted, the default program will be run.
• cwd - the current working directory to set for the command.
• set_environment_variables - a table specifying key/value pairs to set in the environment
• domain - specifies the domain into which the tab will be spawned. See SpawnTab for examples.

local wezterm = require 'wezterm';

return {
  keys = {
    -- CMD-y starts `top` in a new window
    {key="y", mods="CMD", action=wezterm.action{SpawnCommandInNewWindow={
      args={"top"}
    }}},
  }
}

ToggleFullScreen

Toggles full screen mode for the current window. (But see: https://github.com/wez/wezterm/issues/177)

return {
  keys = {
    {key="n", mods="SHIFT|CTRL", action="ToggleFullScreen"},
  }
}

Copy

Copy the selection to the clipboard. On X11 systems, this populates both the Clipboard and the Primary Selection.

local wezterm = require 'wezterm';
return {
  keys = {
    {key="c", mods="SHIFT|CTRL", action="Copy"},
  }
}

Paste

Paste the clipboard to the current tab. On X11 systems, this copies from the Clipboard rather than the Primary Selection. See also PastePrimarySelection.

local wezterm = require 'wezterm';
return {
  keys = {
    {key="v", mods="SHIFT|CTRL", action="Paste"},
  }
}

PastePrimarySelection

X11: Paste the Primary Selection to the current tab. On other systems, this behaves identically to Paste.

local wezterm = require 'wezterm';
return {
  keys = {
    {key="v", mods="SHIFT|CTRL", action="PastePrimarySelection"},
  }
}

ActivateTabRelative

Activate a tab relative to the current tab. The argument value specifies an offset. eg: -1 activates the tab to the left of the current tab, while 1 activates the tab to the right.

local wezterm = require 'wezterm';
return {
  keys = {
    {key="{", mods="SHIFT|ALT", action=wezterm.action{ActivateTabRelative=-1}},
    {key="}", mods="SHIFT|ALT", action=wezterm.action{ActivateTabRelative=1}},
  }
}

ActivateTab

Activate the tab specified by the argument value. eg: 0 activates the leftmost tab, while 1 activates the second tab from the left, and so on.

since: 20200620-160318-e00b076c

ActivateTab now accepts negative numbers; these wrap around from the start of the tabs to the end, so -1 references the right-most tab, -2 the tab to its left and so on.

local wezterm = require 'wezterm';

local mykeys = {}
for i = 1, 8 do
  -- CTRL+ALT + number to activate that tab
  table.insert(mykeys, {
    key=tostring(i),
    mods="CTRL|ALT",
    action=wezterm.action{ActivateTab=i-1},
  })
  -- F1 through F8 to activate that tab
  table.insert(mykeys, {
    key="F" .. tostring(i),
    action=wezterm.action{ActivateTab=i-1},
  })
end

return {
  keys = mykeys,
}

IncreaseFontSize

Increases the font size of the current window by 10%

local wezterm = require 'wezterm';
return {
  keys = {
    {key="=", mods="CTRL", action="IncreaseFontSize"},
  }
}

DecreaseFontSize

Decreases the font size of the current window by 10%

local wezterm = require 'wezterm';
return {
  keys = {
    {key="-", mods="CTRL", action="DecreaseFontSize"},
  }
}

ResetFontSize

Reset the font size for the current window to the value in your configuration

local wezterm = require 'wezterm';
return {
  keys = {
    {key="0", mods="CTRL", action="ResetFontSize"},
  }
}

SendString

Sends the string specified argument to the terminal in the current tab, as though that text were literally typed into the terminal.

local wezterm = require 'wezterm';

return {
  keys = {
    {key="m", mods="CMD", action=wezterm.action{SendString="Hello"}},
  }
}

You can also emit escape sequences using SendString. This example shows how to bind Alt-LeftArrow/RightArrow to the Alt-b/f, an emacs style keybinding for moving backwards/forwards through a word in a line editor.

\x1b is the ESC character:

local wezterm = require 'wezterm';

return {
  keys = {
    -- Make Option-Left equivalent to Alt-b which many line editors interpret as backward-word
    {key="LeftArrow", mods="OPT", action=wezterm.action{SendString="\x1bb"}},
    -- Make Option-Right equivalent to Alt-f; forward-word
    {key="RightArrow", mods="OPT", action=wezterm.action{SendString="\x1bf"}},
  }
}

DisableDefaultAssignment

Has no special meaning of its own; this action will undo the registration of a default assignment if that key/mouse/modifier combination is one of the default assignments and cause the key press to be propagated through to the tab for processing.

return {
  keys = {
    -- Turn off the default CMD-m Hide action, allowing CMD-m to
    -- be potentially recognized and handled by the tab
    {key="m", mods="CMD", action="DisableDefaultAssignment"},
  }
}

Nop

Causes the key press to have no effect; it behaves as though those keys were not pressed.

return {
  keys = {
    -- Turn off any side effects from pressing CMD-m
    {key="m", mods="CMD", action="Nop"},
  }
}

Hide

Hides the current window

return {
  keys = {
    {key="h", mods="CMD", action="Hide"},
  }
}

HideApplication

On macOS, hide the WezTerm application.

return {
  keys = {
    {key="h", mods="CMD", action="HideApplication"},
  }
}

QuitApplication

Terminate the WezTerm application, killing all tabs.

return {
  keys = {
    {key="q", mods="CMD", action="QuitApplication"},
  }
}

Show

Shows the current window.

CloseCurrentTab

Equivalent to clicking the x on the window title bar to close it: Closes the current tab. If that was the last tab, closes that window. If that was the last window, wezterm terminates.

return {
  keys = {
    {key="w", mods="CMD", action="CloseCurrentTab"},
  }
}

MoveTabRelative

Move the current tab relative to its peers. The argument specifies an offset. eg: -1 moves the tab to the left of the current tab, while 1 moves the tab to the right.

local wezterm = require 'wezterm';
return {
  keys = {
    {key="{", mods="SHIFT|ALT", action=wezterm.action{MoveTabRelative=-1}},
    {key="}", mods="SHIFT|ALT", action=wezterm.action{MoveTabRelative=1}},
  }
}

MoveTab

Move the tab so that it has the index specified by the argument. eg: 0 moves the tab to be leftmost, while 1 moves the tab so that it is second tab from the left, and so on.

local wezterm = require 'wezterm';

local mykeys = {}
for i = 1, 8 do
  -- CTRL+ALT + number to move to that position
  table.insert(mykeys, {
    key=tostring(i),
    mods="CTRL|ALT",
    action=wezterm.action{Move=i-1},
  })
end

return {
  keys = mykeys,
}

ScrollByPage

Adjusts the scroll position by the number of pages specified by the argument. Negative values scroll upwards, while positive values scroll downwards.

local wezterm = require 'wezterm';

return {
  keys = {
    {key="PageUp", mods="SHIFT", action=wezterm.action{ScrollByPage=-1}},
    {key="PageDown", mods="SHIFT", action=wezterm.action{ScrollByPage=1}},
  }
}

ClearScrollback

Clears the lines that have scrolled off the top of the viewport, resetting the scrollbar thumb to the full height of the window.

return {
  keys = {
    {key="K", mods="CTRL|SHIFT", action="ClearScrollback"}
  }
}

ReloadConfiguration

Explicitly reload the configuration.

return {
  keys = {
    {key="r", mods="CMD|SHIFT", action="ReloadConfiguration"},
  }
}

ShowLauncher

Activate the Launcher Menu in the current tab.

return {
  keys = {
    {key="l", mods="ALT", action="ShowLauncher"},
  }
}

ShowTabNavigator

Activate the tab navigator UI in the current tab. The tab navigator displays a list of tabs and allows you to select and activate a tab from that list.

return {
  keys = {
    {key="F9", mods="ALT", action="ShowTabNavigator"},
  }
}

SelectTextAtMouseCursor

Initiates selection of text at the current mouse cursor position. The mode argument can be one of Cell, Word or Line to control the scope of the selection.

ExtendSelectionToMouseCursor

Extends the current text selection to the current mouse cursor position. The mode argument can be one of Cell, Word or Line to control the scope of the selection.

It is also possible to leave the mode unspecified like this:

return {
  mouse_bindings = {
    {
      event={Up={streak=1, button="Left"}},
      mods="SHIFT",
      -- Note that there is no `wezterm.action` here
      action={ExtendSelectionToMouseCursor={}},
    },
  }
}

when unspecified, wezterm will use a default mode which at the time of writing is Cell, but in a future release may be context sensitive based on recent actions.

OpenLinkAtMouseCursor

If the current mouse cursor position is over a cell that contains a hyperlink, this action causes that link to be opened.

CompleteSelection

Completes an active text selection process; the selection range is marked closed and then the selected text is copied as though the Copy action was executed.

CompleteSelectionOrOpenLinkAtMouseCursor

If a selection is in progress, acts as though CompleteSelection was triggered. Otherwise acts as though OpenLinkAtMouseCursor was triggered.

Search

since: 20200607-144723-74889cd4

This action will trigger the search overlay for the current tab. It accepts a typed pattern string as its parameter, allowing for Regex, CaseSensitiveString and CaseInSensitiveString as pattern matching types.

The supported regular expression syntax is described here.

local wezterm = require 'wezterm';
return {
  keys = {
    -- search for things that look like git hashes
    {key="H", mods="SHIFT|CTRL", action=wezterm.action{Search={Regex="[a-f0-9]{6,}"}}},
    -- search for the lowercase string "hash" matching the case exactly
    {key="H", mods="SHIFT|CTRL", action=wezterm.action{Search={CaseSensitiveString="hash"}}},
    -- search for the string "hash" matching regardless of case
    {key="H", mods="SHIFT|CTRL", action=wezterm.action{Search={CaseInSensitiveString="hash"}}},
  },
}

ActivateCopyMode

since: 20200607-144723-74889cd4

Activates copy mode!

Learn more about copy mode