Keyboard Shortcuts

Common keyboard shortcuts in Devin CLI

Every shortcut on this page is a default — shortcuts are rebindable. Run /shortcuts to browse and rebind them interactively, or edit the keymap section of your config file directly.

Input Shortcuts

These shortcuts work while typing at the prompt.

Shortcut	Description
Enter	Submit your message
Shift+Enter* or Alt+Enter	Insert a newline (for multi-line input)
Shift+Tab	Cycle between modes (Normal, Accept Edits, Smart, Bypass, Autonomous)
Ctrl+C	Cancel current input (clears text), or cancel running agent
Ctrl+D	Exit (when input is empty)
Esc	Cancel running agent
Ctrl+G	Open external editor for composing your message
Ctrl+R	Open fuzzy search over previous prompts and insert the selected prompt
Ctrl+O	Open full-screen viewer for the thinking trace
Ctrl+L	Redraw / refresh the screen
Ctrl+V or Shift+Insert	Paste from clipboard (images appear in input area; use Left/Right to navigate, Backspace to remove)
!	Enter bash mode to run a shell command directly (when input is empty). Press Backspace or Esc on an empty input to exit bash mode
@	Open file/directory autocomplete to add context

On macOS, Alt is the Option key. Some shortcuts below use Alt (Option) as a modifier. We recommend configuring Option as Meta for the best experience.

* Requires a compatible terminal. Terminals that do not support the Kitty keyboard protocol cannot distinguish Shift+Enter from Enter. Use Alt+Enter or Ctrl+J instead.

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Mode & Model Shortcuts

Shortcut	Description
Shift+Tab	Cycle to the next mode (Normal → Accept Edits → Smart → Bypass → Autonomous → Normal)
Alt+T (macOS: Opt+T)	Cycle thinking level for the current model

Smart mode is rolling out gradually; the cycle skips it when it is not enabled for your account. Autonomous only appears in sandbox sessions, where it is the only available permission mode.

You can also switch modes with slash commands: /normal, /accept-edits, /smart, /plan, /bypass, or /mode <name>. Use /ask <question> as a oneshot command to ask questions without switching modes.

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Rebinding Shortcuts

Run /shortcuts to open an interactive list of every shortcut, grouped by category. Type to search across all categories, press Enter on an action to rebind it, then press the key combination you want. Each row shows the action’s context.action identifier (for example editor.accept_line) — that is the key to use when editing the config file by hand. Rebinding from /shortcuts saves the new binding to your user config.

To set bindings directly, add a keymap section to your config file:

// ~/.config/devin/config.json
{
  "keymap": {
    "global": {
      "clear_screen": "ctrl-shift-k"
    }
  }
}

Ctrl+C cannot be unbound — it always cancels the running agent.

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Text Editing

The input uses readline-style or Emacs-style keybindings for text editing.

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Customizing Keybindings

Every keybinding can be viewed — and most can be changed — from inside the CLI or via the config file.

Browsing shortcuts with /shortcuts

Run /shortcuts to open an interactive picker listing every keybinding, grouped by category (Input, Mode & model, Text editing, Lists & pickers, Completion, Prompts & panels, Config editor, and more). Each row shows the active keys, a description, and the shortcut’s context.action identifier (e.g. editor.insert_newline) — the identifier you use for config-file overrides. Type to search across all categories.

Rebinding interactively

In /shortcuts, press Enter on a shortcut row, then press the new key combination:

Press the new key for Open external editor (readbox_input.open_external_editor)
Currently: ctrl+g
any key rebind · esc cancel

The change takes effect immediately and is saved to the keymap section of your user config file, so it persists across sessions. Press Esc to cancel without changing anything.

A few global “chrome” keys (clear screen, the thinking-trace viewer, force full redraw) can’t be rebound interactively — the picker shows can't be rebound — because the rebind prompt must capture every key. You can still override them via the config file.

Rebinding via the config file

Add a keymap section to your user config (~/.config/devin/config.json; %APPDATA%\devin\config.json on Windows). Overrides are keyed by context, then action:

{
  "keymap": {
    "global": {
      "clear_screen": "ctrl-shift-k",
      "history_search": ["ctrl-r", "f5"],
      "feedback_up": []
    },
    "editor": {
      "insert_newline": ["shift-enter", "alt-enter", "ctrl-j"]
    }
  }
}

• A value may be a single key spec, a list of specs (all of them trigger the action), or an empty list [] to unbind the action.
• Overrides fully replace the built-in defaults for that action; actions you don’t list keep their defaults.
• Find the context.action names in /shortcuts — each row displays its identifier.

See the config file reference for the full key spec syntax.

Key spec syntax

A key spec is zero or more --separated modifiers followed by one key name, e.g. ctrl-shift-p, alt-enter, f5, K:

Element	Values
Modifiers	ctrl/control/c, alt/meta/option/opt/m, shift/s — case-insensitive, any order, no duplicates
Named keys	enter/return, esc/escape, tab, backspace, delete/del, insert/ins, up, down, left, right, home, end, page-up/pageup/pgup, page-down/pagedown/pgdn, space, f1–f24 — case-insensitive
Characters	Any other single character binds that character key, keeping its case: K (equivalently shift-k) binds the shifted letter. Use - for the minus key (ctrl-- is Ctrl+minus)

Validation and conflicts

Invalid entries are reported as warnings at startup and skipped — the rest of your overrides and config still apply:

Warning: keymap: unknown context `bogus_context`
Warning: keymap.editor: unknown action `bogus_action`
Warning: keymap: override creates a conflict (editor: `ctrl+a` bound to both
`beginning_of_line` and `kill_line`); restoring built-in default for `editor.kill_line`

This covers unknown context/action names, malformed key specs, wrong-typed values, and overrides that collide with another binding in the same context (the conflicting override reverts to its default). Ctrl+C (cancel) cannot be unbound.