How to indent/format a selection of code in Visual Studio Code?

Question

I want to indent a specific section of code in Visual Studio Code.

I read How do you format code in Visual Studio Code? that gives shortcuts to indent the whole code, but it doesn't work when selecting a specific section of code.

I tried Ctrl + Shift + F after selecting some line in my code, but the whole file is indented. I'm on Windows with Visual Studio Code Insider 1.8.0. How can I do it?

score 352 · Accepted Answer · edited Feb 21 '23 at 03:03

352

I want to indent a specific section of code in Visual Studio Code:

Select the lines you want to indent.
Use Ctrl + ] to indent them.

If you want to format a section (instead of indenting it):

Select the lines you want to format.
Use Ctrl + K, Ctrl + F to format them.

edited Feb 21 '23 at 03:03

answered Nov 08 '16 at 22:40

Shaun Luttin

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Shift + Alt + F can also be used for formatting ( Windows Platform ) – SridharKritha May 02 '17 at 16:29
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Ctrl + ] or Ctrl + [ is conflicted with vim plugin. – chenzhongpu Nov 24 '21 at 07:35
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If you are using the vim plugin, you can just indent using the vim command: > in visual line mode. – Richard Povinelli Jan 19 '22 at 15:14
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This doesn't work by default anymore on Windows. You need to set the shortcut for `Reindent Selected Lines` under _Keyboard Shortcuts_ – rboy Mar 23 '22 at 18:20
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Formatting a code block, plus increase/decrease indent short keys should be given a good exposure by default in VsCode under any menu, say the EDIT menu for example. – Ali Mar 26 '22 at 17:12
@RichardPovinelli comment about indenting while using the vim plugin is excellent and I would add to it that my usual way of indenting in vim land : mark the top line (as 'a' for instance) ; mark the bottom line (as 'b' for instance); then (assuming my example marks) 'a,'b> will not work as it's not currently supported. This led me to think that indenting wasn't supported at all if you were using the vim plugin but, as Richard points out, that's not so. – glaucon Apr 25 '22 at 05:32
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Thank you !! VS Code user since ages, I did *not* know this :d – Goodies Nov 04 '22 at 00:09
@SridharKritha: on my system (Win 10; VS Code 1.76.1) ALT+SHIFT+F is hard-coded to use 4 spaces per indent level/tab stop. It ignores the tab and indent settings in the editor. – mnemotronic Mar 12 '23 at 23:31

Mohamed Allal · Answer 2 · 2023-02-20T22:03:54.330

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You can also indent a whole section (multi-lines) by selecting it and clicking TAB
and also indent backward using Shift+TAB

And of course for auto indentation and formatting, following the language you're using, you can see which good extensions do the good job, and which formatters to install or which parameters settings to enable or set. For each language and its available tools. Just make sure to read well the documentation of the extension, to install and set all what it needs. Exemple: prettier is the most common used formatter for JavaScript and typescript. And it's widely used by all projects and code style requirements and setup. And in CI pipelines.

Up to now the indentation problem bothers me with Python when copy pasting a block of code. If that's the case, here is how you solve that: Visual Studio Code indentation for Python

edited Feb 20 '23 at 22:03

answered Oct 23 '17 at 23:13

Mohamed Allal

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this doesn't work in VS Code for me, pressing tab while selecting text simply adds a tab where my cursor is – Abe Fehr Aug 06 '18 at 13:38
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I think you selected only a portion of one line text. For that to work, you have too cases: you have selected multi-lines and in such a case it doesn't matter how much you selected, it will work. The other case is to select the whole line where it will work too. If you select just a portion from one line, then the behavior is that a tab will be inserted in place of the selected text. I tested that in both windows and linux systems. Confirm if it's the same with you, or there is something wrong with your config. – Mohamed Allal Aug 14 '18 at 21:59
MacOS Maverick (12) with non US keyboard: works like a charm. Thanks a lot. Happy 2022 – Robert Alexander Jan 01 '22 at 16:06
It works on MacOS Big Sur with Italian keyboard – alec_djinn Jun 03 '22 at 16:18

score 23 · Answer 3 · edited Jun 13 '20 at 00:36

23

On OS X, choose "Document Format", and select all lines that you need format.

Then Option + Shift + F.

edited Jun 13 '20 at 00:36

Peter Mortensen

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answered Nov 22 '18 at 23:47

Adrian Romero

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This appears to do the whole file, not the selection :( – GreenAsJade Apr 25 '19 at 11:58
It works properly. I have a macbook air 2019, keyboard is different of my old ( I used to CMD + [ or ]). I have been look for this shortcut for the new keyboard. And, it is exactly what i was looking. It also works for a selection. Thks. – LuizEduardoMPF Aug 11 '19 at 11:18
I was able to get this to work on a block of selected text (though I had to choose from an available formatter for my language) – joar Jun 30 '21 at 19:51
The plug-in autopep8 needs to be installed – Ray Mar 27 '23 at 01:01

auspicious99 · Answer 4 · 2023-01-04T04:55:42.523

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(This works at least up to version 1.74.2, checked in Jan 2023)

On macOS Visual Studio Code version 1.36.1 (2019)

Visual Studio Code version 1.36.1 (2019)

To auto-format the selection, use ⌘K ⌘F (the trick is that this is to be done in sequence, ⌘K first, followed by ⌘F).

Auto-format selection or document

To just indent (shift right) without auto-formatting, use ⌘]

Indent options

As in Keyboard Shortcuts (⌘K ⌘S, or from the menu as shown below)

Keyboard shortcuts

edited Jan 04 '23 at 04:55

answered Oct 27 '19 at 04:36

auspicious99

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Thanks for the "trick". I was losing my mind because the shortcut `alt/option + f` used to work!!! And suddenly it got replaced by ` ̰` character. So annoying! – Glenn Posadas May 31 '20 at 12:53
Glad it helped you Glenn. – auspicious99 May 31 '20 at 13:44
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It's strange that we have to find answers here for such simple shortcuts of a very popular code editor! VS Code shortcuts are not intuitive! :) – Chintan Shah Jan 05 '23 at 14:23
Haha, I guess we can ask Microsoft about that. – auspicious99 Jan 05 '23 at 15:22

score 10 · Answer 5 · edited Jun 13 '20 at 00:45

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This should be able to set to whatever keybindings you want for indent/outdent here:

Menu File → Preferences → Keyboard Shortcuts

editor.action.indentLines

editor.action.outdentLines

edited Jun 13 '20 at 00:45

Peter Mortensen

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answered Nov 28 '19 at 14:20

ooXei1sh

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thank you! I was searching the keyboard shortcuts for `dedent` (which we use in our codebase), but it's `outdent`. Thank you. – sming Jan 25 '20 at 16:09

score 5 · Answer 6 · edited Jun 13 '20 at 00:49

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F1 → open Keyboard Shortcuts → search for 'Indent Line', and change keybinding to Tab.

Right click > "Change when expression" to editorHasSelection && editorTextFocus && !editorReadonly

It will allow you to indent line when something in that line is selected (multiple lines still work).

edited Jun 13 '20 at 00:49

Peter Mortensen

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answered May 22 '20 at 10:45

nevrast

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"F1"? Do you mean menu *File* → *Preferences*? – Peter Mortensen Jun 13 '20 at 00:49
I meant opening command pallette. Forgot its name and I just remembered the default shortcut, sorry! – nevrast Jun 15 '20 at 14:26

score 5 · Answer 7 · answered Mar 23 '22 at 18:30

As you've seen there are two ways to indent the code (this for Windows).

Reindenting the entire file

Shift+Alt+F

Reindenting only selected lines

First set the shortcut for Reindent Selected Lines

Menu File → Preferences → Keyboard Shortcuts → In the Search in keybindings type in Reindent Selected Lines → Select it and press Enter → Type in your own shortcut, e.g. Shift + 5, followed by Enter

Now select your code lines in the editor and use the shortcut set above, e.g. Shift + 5, to automatically indent those lines only.

score 4 · Answer 8 · answered Mar 26 '21 at 06:58

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For German keyboard layout, the standard settings are:

Indent selection: Strg + ´
Outdent selection: Strg + ß

answered Mar 26 '21 at 06:58

Marten Schlüter

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score 3 · Answer 9 · answered Jan 06 '23 at 02:45

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This is the way I had my code before formatting...

Then I used the command like this... (Make sure to select the code part that you need to format)

Shift+ Alt+F

And I got the formatted code like this....

answered Jan 06 '23 at 02:45

Mangala Karunarathne

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Hari Bhaskar · Answer 10 · 2022-05-18T06:53:56.633

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On windows its "Ctrl+[" and "Ctrl+]" for indent and unindent You can find rest of the shortcuts here

For mac, you can find the shortcuts here: https://code.visualstudio.com/docs/getstarted/keybindings

edited May 18 '22 at 06:53

answered May 18 '22 at 06:52

Hari Bhaskar

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The [image you have linked here](https://i.stack.imgur.com/riyJG.png) helped me to understand that "unindent" is called "outdent" in VSCode/ codium, so I could find it in the keyboard shortcut settings and assign a shortcut to it. – Golar Ramblar Jan 28 '23 at 21:19

score 2 · Answer 11 · answered Sep 17 '22 at 20:46

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On linux ubuntu: select text then ctrl + shift + i

answered Sep 17 '22 at 20:46

Benjamin Ronneling

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Doesn't work. This formats the entire documen even if you have selected lines!! – Martijn Hiemstra Oct 26 '22 at 07:57

score 1 · Answer 12 · answered Jul 03 '20 at 05:49

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For me on windows it was Ctrl+¡ , indent line. It adds a tab at the beggining of each line.

answered Jul 03 '20 at 05:49

cladelpino

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score 1 · Answer 13 · answered May 21 '22 at 18:51

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Many of the answers were not able to solve my problem too.

Just go for fn+tab

Welcome in advance.

answered May 21 '22 at 18:51

Chandranshu Gautam

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Function keys aren't standardized. What keycode does this send on your machine? – ChrisGPT was on strike May 22 '22 at 22:59

score 0 · Answer 14 · answered Jan 13 '22 at 16:07

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For me, using a mac in 2022 it was CMD + ] to indent multiple lines after selecting the desired indented lines.

answered Jan 13 '22 at 16:07

Andrew Smith

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score 0 · Answer 15 · answered Feb 09 '22 at 18:07

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Crtl + Alt + F can also formate (windows)

answered Feb 09 '22 at 18:07

Meshu Deb Nath

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score 0 · Answer 16 · edited Mar 12 '22 at 15:53

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Windows - 2022

Shift+Alt+F

edited Mar 12 '22 at 15:53

AEM

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answered Mar 04 '22 at 22:16

Jose Guijarro

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How to indent/format a selection of code in Visual Studio Code?

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