Mac Terminal: move the cursor forward and back one word at a time

In this Bash shell keyboard shortcuts article that's showing up in the next "Via del.icio.us" post, the combination I was most interested in tracking down was how to move forward and backward by word:

  • Alt + F - Move cursor forward one word on the current line
  • Alt + B - Move cursor backward one word on the current line

These shortcuts, as well as any of the others listed with "Alt", will likely work in Mac OS X's Terminal program if you turn on "Use option key as meta key" (under Terminal > Windows Settings > Keyboard).

Post new comment

The content of this field is kept private and will not be shown publicly.
  • You can use Markdown syntax to format and style the text. Also see Markdown Extra for tables, footnotes, and more.
  • Allowed HTML tags: <a> <cite> <code> <strong> <em> <blockquote> <b> <i> <p> <br> <ul> <ol> <li> <small>
  • Lines and paragraphs break automatically.

More information about formatting options