How do I make Git use the editor of my choice for commits?

Question

I would prefer to write my commit messages in Vim, but it is opening them in Emacs.

How do I configure Git to always use Vim? Note that I want to do this globally,

Answer 1

On Ubuntu and also Debian (thanks @MichielB) changing the default editor is also possible by running:

sudo update-alternatives --config editor

Which will prompt the following:

There are 4 choices for the alternative editor (providing /usr/bin/editor).

  Selection    Path                Priority   Status
------------------------------------------------------------
  0            /bin/nano            40        auto mode
  1            /bin/ed             -100       manual mode
  2            /bin/nano            40        manual mode
* 3            /usr/bin/vim.basic   30        manual mode
  4            /usr/bin/vim.tiny    10        manual mode

Press enter to keep the current choice[*], or type selection number: 

Answer 2

On macOS Big Sur (11.0) beta for TextMate: none of the environment variable options worked. (Set all three: GIT_EDITOR, VISUAL, and EDITOR.)

Finally set the global core.editor in git, and that worked:
git config --global core.editor "~/bin/mate -w"

Answer 3

When using git-review I had to modify sequence.editor value to be able to do interactive rebase (git rebase -i -p):

git config --global sequence.editor "gvim"  # or whatever your prefer

gvim require: apt install vim-gtk

References

• #2944 Interactive Rebase failed with warning: "Vim: Warning: Output is not to a terminal"
• Install section of sjurba/rebase-editor

Answer 4

For Textmate Users

This opens Textmate editor in when you want to edit your commits. Requires textmate command line tools to be installed.

git config --global core.editor "mate -w"

Answer 5

For emacs users

.emacs:

(server-start)

shellrc:

export EDITOR=emacsclient

Answer 6

Just try EDITOR=vim git commit.

Or you can set your EDITOR to vim by export EDITOR=vim in your bashrc.