Learn Vim by playing a game

Vimrealm is a pixel-art fantasy RPG for developers who write code every day but have never learned Vim. You learn Vim the way Vim is used: by typing real Vim commands. There are no multiple-choice quizzes and no flashcards.

It runs in your browser with nothing to install. The first five chapters, all about moving around, are free.

How the Vim game works

Every level is a text buffer turned into an island, seen from an isometric angle. Each character is a tile: letters are grey stone, digits are blue crystal, punctuation is golden sandstone and spaces are grass. A small wizard stands on the tile under the cursor.

When you press w, the wizard leaps to the next word. When you press dd, a whole row of tiles drops away. Below the island, the Scroll of Text shows the same buffer flat, the way your editor would, with relative line numbers, so what you see on the island maps straight onto real Vim.

• Reach quests: land the cursor on each gem or slime, in order. Every target comes with a hint for the command to use.
• Edit quests: make the buffer match a goal text. Lines that still differ glow red, and the goal panel ticks off each line as you fix it.
• Commands unlock as you learn them. Try one you haven't learned yet and the game tells you which chapter teaches it. The arrow keys are sealed for good.
• Par and stars. Each quest has a par keystroke count taken from a reference solution. Finish at or under par for three stars, and learn to edit with fewer keystrokes.
• A real Vim emulator handles Normal, Insert, Visual, Visual Line and Command-line modes, with counts, operators combined with motions, text objects, registers, undo and redo, dot-repeat and search.

The Vim curriculum

The Sage Modalus guides you through 13 chapters and 34 quests. Each chapter teaches a handful of commands and builds on the ones before it. Want a quick reference while you play? Keep the Vim cheat sheet open in another tab, or read the guides to text objects and the dot command.

The Trials: practice after the story

Once the dragon falls, 60 Trials in six chapters keep the commands in your fingers. Each one drills spells you already know with a twist: some commands are forbidden, the keystrokes are limited, one failed command ends a flawless run, or a sand-glass is running.

Trials of Motion · Trials of the Seeker · Trials of the Scribe · Trials of Objects · Trials of Echoes · The Gauntlet

Free and full version

What you need

• A modern browser and a physical keyboard. Vimrealm doesn't work on touch screens.
• No Vim experience. The first quest starts with h j k l.
• Already know some Vim? Press "I know some Vim: unlock all quests" on the quest map to jump ahead.

The emulator covers the parts of Vim the course teaches, not all of Vim. It has no macros, marks, named registers, ex ranges or :s, and search matches literal text rather than regular expressions.

Frequently asked questions

Is Vimrealm free?

Chapters 1–5, which teach every movement command, are free and need no account. The full version, chapters 6–13 plus 60 Trials and cloud saves, is $7.99 as one payment with no subscription.

Do I need to know Vim already?

No. The first quest starts with h, j, k and l. If you already know some Vim, the quest map has a button to unlock every quest.

Is it real Vim?

The game uses an emulator of the parts of Vim it teaches, so the commands are the real ones. It has no macros, marks, named registers, ex ranges or :s, and search matches literal text rather than regular expressions.

Does it work on a phone or tablet?

No. You type Vim commands, so Vimrealm needs a physical keyboard. These reading pages work on any device.