15

After a search I've done, all the matches for the respective query remain highlighted and it's annoying. This happens even after I close the respective file (normal behavior?). How to I remove this?

studiohack
  • 13,477
Alex
  • 1,865

5 Answers5

16

To turn off highlighting until the next search:

:noh

To turn off all highlighting:

`:nohlsearch`

But you don't want to type that every time. Put this in your ~/.vimrc:

nnoremap <silent> <leader>n :nohlsearch<CR>

After that, you just enter your leader (which by default is \) and then n to clear the matches. You don't need to use n; if you prefer, pick something else.

You can also remap your leader to something more comfortable, if you like. I use a comma:

let mapleader = ","

(That goes before the mapping to clear searches.)

UPDATE: the help for 'incsearch' suggests something even better.

augroup vimrc-incsearch-highlight
      autocmd!
      autocmd CmdlineEnter /,\? :set hlsearch
      autocmd CmdlineLeave /,\? :set nohlsearch
augroup END

This automatically turns on highlighting while you search but also automatically turns off highlighting as soon as you leave the search by hitting enter or otherwise leaving the search.

Telemachus
  • 7,065
11

i just /qiw772723euz to "search" for something thats not in the file. hacky workaround, i know, i am interested in a real solution as well :)

akira
  • 63,447
4

Similar to @Telemachus answer above, a comment on this answer over at SO by @David Winslow suggested mapping a toggle of hlsearch. You would map the following:

nmap <silent> <leader>n :set hlsearch!<CR>

Hitting n would then toggle highlight search off and on every time you hit it.

Community
  • 1
technomalogical
  • 733
3

In my config, I clear highlighted search terms by just hitting enter in command mode. This is how that's configured.

set hlsearch    " highlight all matched terms
" Pressing return clears highlighted search
:nnoremap <CR> :nohlsearch<CR>/<BS>

As a side note, I like to make sure that my search matches are highlighted super clearly, no matter the color scheme, so I give them black text on a yellow background.

" When highlighting search terms, make sure text is contrasting color
:highlight Search ctermbg=yellow ctermfg=black
" Do the same for gvim
:highlight Search guibg=yellow guifg=black
Nathan Long
  • 27,435
0

I have a slightly different solution. To me it feels as the natural thing to do would be to press <esc> to make it go away. However, that doesn't work. Mapping <esc> to :noh has nasty side-effects, so that's not an option either. <Leader>n and similar mappings feels unintuitive for me for such a trivial task. However, pressing <esc> twice is something I can live with:

nnoremap <silent> <esc><esc> :nohlsearch<CR>

sigvaldm
  • 111