How to Split Screens in vim

Have you ever found yourself going through a long file in vim and wishing you could split your screen? Perhaps you want to make some comparison with a chunk at the top of file with something in the middle. With a few keystrokes you can do exactly that.

Split Horizontally

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To split the screen horizontally:
a.) Hit CTRL + w
b.) and then s.

If you want to navigate between the screen:
a.) Hit CTRL + w
b.) and then w.

To exit out of one of the screen:
a.) Go into command mode (i.e. hit ESC)
b.) and quit as usual: :q.

Split Vertically

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To split the screen vertically, much like splitting horizontally:
a.) Start by hitting CTRL + w
b.) but then hit v (instead of s).

Navigating between the split screens is the same (CTRL + w + w).

Though horizontal splitting works great. I find vertical splitting to be the most useful.

Combine Both

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Why choose? It is possible to combine both horizontal and vertical screen splitting as well.