Exit from Terminal mode in Neovim/Vim 8

Question

I can't figure out how to go back to Normal mode after entering Terminal in Insert mode...

Escape just doesn't seem to work.

Any idea?

Answer 1

You are supposed to press CTRL+\CTRL+n.

See :help terminal-emulator for a mapping suggestion.

Answer 2

The answer by @romainl is correct but I wanted to add a bit more info for anyone that may have stumbled on this from google like I did.

Directly from the docs we get this note:

Terminal mode has its own namespace for mappings, which is accessed with the "t" prefix. It's possible to use terminal mappings to customize interaction with the terminal. For example, here's how to map to exit terminal mode:

:tnoremap <Esc> <C-\><C-n>

With that knowledge you will most likely need to create some terminal mappings to stay inline with your current workflow (tab/window movement, etc.)

Answer 3

According to vim documentation, there are two ways:

1. CTRL-W N (note it's uppercase N)
2. CTRL-\ CTRL-n

Use CTRL-W N (or 'termwinkey' N) to switch to Terminal-Normal mode. Now the contents of the terminal window is under control of Vim, the job output is suspended. CTRL-\ CTRL-N does the same.

Answer 4

Exit & close

tnoremap <Esc> <C-\><C-n>:q!<CR>

In Vim 8, this also works:

tnoremap <ESC> <C-w>:q!<CR>

Answer 5

Another simple solution that works for neovim:

If you have the mouse support, simply using the mouse wheel will switch to normal mode.

Answer 6

If you are using Tmux, you may have installed some "vim-like" bindings to move around in the window panes which among other things grab the "C-\" before Vim has a chance to use it. If so, remove these from your .tmux.conf and restart tmux:

bind-key -n C-\ if-shell "$is_vim" "send-keys C-\\" "select-pane -l"
bind-key -T copy-mode-vi C-\ select-pane -l

Answer 7

You can just press Ctrl + D in terminal to close it. But if you don't want to close it, just want to switch windows you can do Ctrl-W w (if you have multiple panes you can specify to which you switch with the seccond letter (h,j,k,l), W just switches vim windows.

Answer 8

Well, I am surprised that no other commment mention it so maybe it's bad practice but I personnaly just typed exit and it worked.

Answer 9

In my case (I use <leader>x, to close any buffer), as I have init.lua instead of init.vim my configs are:

-- map helper
local function map(mode, lhs, rhs, opts)
    local options = {noremap = true}
    if opts then options = vim.tbl_extend('force', options, opts) end
    vim.api.nvim_set_keymap(mode, lhs, rhs, options)
end

 
local autocmds = {
    packer = {
        { "BufWritePost", "plugins.lua", "PackerCompile" };
    };
    terminal_job = {
        { "TermOpen", "*", [[tnoremap <buffer> <Esc> <c-\><c-n>]] };
        { "TermOpen", "*", [[tnoremap <buffer> <leader>x <c-\><c-n>:bd!<cr>]] };
        { "TermOpen", "*", [[tnoremap <expr> <A-r> '<c-\><c-n>"'.nr2char(getchar()).'pi' ]]};
        { "TermOpen", "*", "startinsert" };
        { "TermOpen", "*", "setlocal listchars= nonumber norelativenumber" };
    };
    restore_cursor = {
        { 'BufRead', '*', [[call setpos(".", getpos("'\""))]] };
    };
    save_shada = {
        {"VimLeave", "*", "wshada!"};
    };
    resize_windows_proportionally = {
        { "VimResized", "*", ":wincmd =" };
    };
    toggle_search_highlighting = {
        { "InsertEnter", "*", "setlocal nohlsearch" };
    };
    lua_highlight = {
        { "TextYankPost", "*", [[silent! lua vim.highlight.on_yank() {higroup="IncSearch", timeout=400}]] };
    };
    ansi_esc_log = {
        { "BufEnter", "*.log", ":AnsiEsc" };
    };
}

nvim_create_augroups(autocmds)

Answer 10

For me what works is ctr+\+n that combination of keys is what takes me off the insert mode in the terminal mode.

Answer 11

Type exit into the terminal to kill it and it should close.

Answer 12

How about, simply using the below to delete the terminal session? (Note that ! is important)

:bd!

! is needed because stand bd fails if there has been any modification in the buffer and when those modifications are not saved.

Answer 13

I just press i to go into insert mode.