| Command | Meaning |
| h | Move left one character |
| l | Move right one character |
| w | Move right one word |
| b | Move left one word |
| W | Move to beginning of next non-blank word |
| B | Move to beginning of preceding non-blank word |
| e | Move to end of current word |
| E | Move to end of current non-blank word |
| 0 | Move to beginning of line |
| ^ | Move to first non-blank character in line |
| $ | Move to end of line |
| i | Insert text before current character |
| a | Insert text after current character |
| I | Insert text at beginning of line |
| A | Insert text at end of line |
| R | Overwrite existing text |
| dh | Delete one character backwards |
| dl | Delete one character forwards |
| db | Delete one word backwards |
| dw | Delete one word forwards |
| dB | Delete one non-blank word backwards |
| dW | Delete one non-blank word forwards |
| d$ | Delete to end of line |
| d0 | Delete to beginning of line |
| D | Equivalent to d$ (delete to end of line) |
| dd | Equivalent to 0d$ (delete entire line) |
| C | Equivalent to c$ (delete to end of line, enter input mode) |
| cc | Equivalent to 0c$ (delete entire line, enter input mode) |
| x | Equivalent to dl (delete character backwards) |
| X | Equivalent to dh (delete character forwards) |
| k | or - Move backward one line |
| j | or + Move forward one line |
| G | Move to line given by repeat count |
| /string | Search forward for string |
| ?string | Search backward for string |
| n | Repeat search forward |
| N | Repeat search backward |
| fx | Move right to next occurrence of x |
| Fx | Move left to previous occurrence of x |
| tx | Move right to next occurrence of x, then back one space |
| Tx | Move left to previous occurrence of x, then forward one space |
| , | Undo motion of last character finding command |
| ; | Redo last character finding command |
| \ | Do filename completion |
| * | Do wildcard expansion (onto command line) |
| \= | Do wildcard expansion (as printed list) |
| ~ | Invert ("twiddle") case of current character(s) |
| \_ | Append last word of previous command, enter input mode |
| v | Run the fc command on the current line (actually, run the command fc -e ${VISUAL:-${EDITOR:-vi}}). Usually this means run the full vi on the current line. |
| [CTRL-L] | Start a new line and redraw the current line on it |
| # | Prepend # (comment character) to the line and send it |
| x | Insert expansion of alias _x |