FAQ

How can I disable Vimium on certain sites, like Gmail?

Click on the Vimium icon in your Chrome's toolbar. From there you can permanently exclude the current site. Or, if you prefer to mix Vimium's shortcuts with the page's own shortcuts, then you can add a more sophisticated set of exclusion rules.

You can also view and edit all of the sites for which Vimium has been disabled on the options page.

How can I use Vimium on file://... URLs?

Visit chrome://extensions, and tick the box Allow access to file URLs next to Vimium.

(Some users have reported that you need to untick then retick this flag when Vimium upgrades.)

Why doesn't Vimium work on the Chrome Store or URLs starting with chrome://?

Chrome disables all extensions on these pages for security reasons.

Can Vimium focus Chrome's Omnibox for me?

Unfortunately this isn't supported by Chrome's extension API. However, Vimium has its own implementation of the Omnibox (called the Vomnibar) which is chock-full of hotkey goodness. Hit o to access it. Note though that the Omnibox can be accessed via Chrome's default shortcuts to focus on the Omnibox (namely Ctrl-l and Alt-d).

Why does Vimium have its own Vomnibar/Omnibox?

The Omnibox is the URL box in Chrome. It's super handy, but you can't access it using Vimium's shortcuts. This is due to a limitation in Chrome's extension API. We can't script Chrome's omnibox in any way. In fact, we can't even focus/unfocus it programmatically.

As a workaround, Vimium has a lightweight replacement for Chrome's Omnibox. It's easy to focus using a single keyboard shortcut, and it has a powerful and very practical completion system. You can also use it to help you jump to any tab or bookmark.

Why doesn't Vimium's Vomnibar use the custom search engines that can be configured in Chrome?

We would if we could, but unfortunately extensions cannot access the custom search engines which have been configured in Chrome. Here are instructions for quickly setting up custom search engines in Vimium's Vomnibar.

Why, once I hit "gs" for viewing page source, Vimium does not work on newly opened source page view tab?

This is because chrome doesn't allow extensions to access that window.

How can I get Vimium to work on Chrome's New-Tab Page?

The New-Tab Page now supports Chrome extensions. Chrome focuses the omnibox when the New-Tab Page is opened, so to use a Vimium command you should focus the page by clicking, double-tapping <F6> or pressing <Tab>. If this isn't to your liking, you could try using an extension which bounces the new-tab page to a page of your choice which supports Vimium better.

Why can't I remap Ctrl-N and similar keys on Linux and Windows?

Chrome won't let extensions like Vimium interfere with certain application-level key bindings.

Why the scrolling behavior is so odd on my Linux?

Some Linux systems have applied Wayland, while Firefox can not work prefectly on Wayland (up to Firefox 70.0.1, tested on 2019-11-04) and it will fail to detect repeated keys. Therefore, please download an official version of Firefox (instead of those in systems' software repositories) and then it will run on X11 mode.

Some systems may use a script to setup environment variables and then run Firefox, but if a script writes export MOZ_USE_XINPUT2=1, then the detection will also fail. In this case please modify the script and ensure MOZ_USE_XINPUT2 is empty or 0.

For more discussions, please see #3386.