How I Setup Neovim On My Mac To Make It Amazing - Complete Guide

Hey guys! In this video, I'm setting up Neovim from scratch to turn it into something pretty amazing. I'll be talking about pretty much everything including configuring basic options, installing my favorite plugins, setting up LSP, and a lot more! I hope this video serves as inspiration for your own setups and also as a detailed guide for all things Neovim. Hope you enjoy it!
Help Support Me And The Channel: www.buymeacoffee.com/joseanma... 🙏🏽
Below is a link to a repository with my dev environment files. Everything you'll need will be in the ".config/nvim" directory!
🚀 Code: github.com/josean-dev/dev-env...
The code above is no longer my most recent neovim setup. You can find my most recent setup with lazy.nvim instead of packer here: github.com/josean-dev/dev-env...
Terminal Setup Video: • How To Make Your Borin...
Tmux Setup Video: • How I Use Tmux With Ne...
⏰ Timestamps
00:00 - Introduction
01:27 - Installing Neovim
01:57 - Basic File Structure
05:40 - Basic Options & Settings
10:30 - Packer Plugin Manager
12:48 - Colorscheme Setup
15:32 - Custom Keymaps
19:28 - Window Related Plugins
21:51 - Essential Plugins
23:16 - Commenting Plugin
25:32 - Plenary Plugin
25:54 - Nvim-Tree File Explorer
31:03 - VS Code Like Icons
31:54 - Lualine Statusline
35:45 - Telescope Fuzzy Finder
40:24 - Basic Autocompletion
45:17 - Configuring LSP
56:27 - LSP In Action
1:00:49 - Formatting & Linting
1:07:32 - Treesitter Highlighting & Autoclosing
1:12:29 - Git Integration
1:14:12 - Conclusion
Corrections:
55:00 - This lspsaga configuration no longer works after an update to the package. Fixed in repo.
1:08:13 - There is something missing in the run function, it has been fixed in the repo
1:08:26 - Do this for autotags instead: "use({ "windwp/nvim-ts-autotag", after = "nvim-treesitter" }) "

[@dstergiou]

What a great tutorial. I loved how you showed the effects of each config line after you added them to the files. Amazingly helpful, congrats on a job very well done!

[@joseanmartinez]

Thanks! Glad I could help! Really appreciate your feedback.

[@albertosilvaus6417]

Josean, you've done an excellent job explaining this, and the code is well written. It was very helpful for me to see the breakdown and different modules in isolation. I really appreciate you sharing this, thanks!

[@joseanmartinez]

Awesome, thanks for the feedback! Glad I could help!

[@casino130]

i've looked at so many guides and here I finally find the file structure shown in detail making it very easy to follow, thank you ser!

[@0xfrian]

This video really helped me fix/clean up my LSP and auto-completion configuration. Mason comes in so clutch. Thanks for all your effort into putting this together!

[@vaylx2253]

I’ve been looking for something like this for a while to move from VSC to Neovim. Watched Chris’ series, Primegean’s, but this is by far the best, most straightforward and in-depth of them all. Instant subscribe from me, please keep it coming. Also at this rate your channel is gonna skyrocket - rightfully so.

[@expirytrader5802]

This is so true

[@joseanmartinez]

I really appreciate that, thanks!

[@bryanmora4996]

I also do think Josean did a wonderful job explaining in detail how to setup a scalable file structure for neovim, for me is even better than the primeagen series

[@AmexL]

@@bryanmora4996 I agree. I liked Primeagen's but I had several errors after following his to 'a-tee' or however that expression goes. This was by far better.

[@DavidHanks90]

Same for me. Liked Prime’s video but he went really quickly and didn’t explain what was going on. There are a few plugins that he uses though that I would add to this config. Probably gonna go through this again specifically for the lsp setup as I think it’s more well rounded than Prime’s.

[@billy.n2813]

You’re doing a great job at explaining. You’re articulate and very well spoken, please continue like this. 🚀

[@joseanmartinez]

Hey! Thank you! I really appreciate that.

[@MarkStrus]

Great Video, thank you so much for taking the time to explain this. I've wanted to learn how to configure NeoVim for a long time but haven't had the time to site down and learn it. This was very helpful and fast. I've been using AstroVim for a while but was never truly satisfied with it. This setup just shows me there are so many possibilities with NeoVim I didn't even realize before.

[@jordanbooker799]

Dude I never would have gotten Neovim set up well enough to try it out as an earnest replacement to vscode without watching your video and repo. Thank you, forreal!

[@ScottMackey]

Josean, that was a close to perfect video to me, with an impressive walk-through of this big(huge) setup and demo's. I'm new to Neovim and wanted to do a custom personalised setup and not use AstroNvim anymore, which I've tested. I was 8hrs in to doing this myself and run in to several obstacles which gave me headaches, with it been such a large amount of new things to learn too. I'll be redoing most of my approach to what you have done now. Thanks for helping me get there sooner! ... a lot sooner 😉

[@joseanmartinez]

That means a lot! I was transitioning from vim to neovim and took the opportunity to gather as much information as I could into one place, which was a lot of work. Really happy to hear you found it helpful and useful for your own setup! Thanks for the awesome feedback, made my day.

[@ForgedDimensions]

genuinely my biggest problem is installing packages, I made so many mistakes that this tutorial was hard to follow because for some reason my path was set to anaconda lol. your walkthrough showed how many mistakes I had made in the past and I appreciate the time and effort that you put into this video! thank you so much

[@oordnave]

Josean, thanks for this amazing tutorial! I followed from the beginning to end, and my neovim is amazing now!

[@robertluong3024]

I'm turning 40 soon. I used to use Vim but I didn't realize how customizable it's become. Great video, very instructive.

[@wewe-fx6un]

*it is Neo vim

[@KhalidThwiny]

Your videos are amazing! You know how to explain things and you are very good at what you are doing. You'll make a great professor. God bless mate!

[@joseanmartinez]

I really appreciate that, thank you for your feedback!

[@RixanNL]

Amazing walktrhough/tutorial. I learned a lot while seting up Neovim together with you. The pacing is appropriatly tuned for the amount of information that is being communicated. Thank you very much.

[@marshmalo1992]

Huge thanks Josean for a video that is well enough explained for a complete beginner, I hit a few issues but was able to google my way through them based on your explaination of what was supposed to be happening vs what I was experiencing. Top notch quality video.

[@joseanmartinez]

That’s really great to hear! Glad you found it helpful and really appreciate the feedback!

[@prashant2782]

The style of delivery is perfect for someone who wants to not only get up and running with neovim but also know what the config really does. Excellent video really helped me finally adopt neovim. Looking forward to the next one!

[@joseanmartinez]

That’s awesome! Thank you for your feedback, I really appreciate it!

[@noelguiavieira]

Absolutely fantastic job, Josean! This series is fantastic and so are your presentation skills.

[@janssenbailio197]

This is the most comprehensible, well thought-out setup for Neovim ever, and I'm truly thankful for this! Cheers man!

[@matsbjnnes366]

This is amazing! For anyone, like me, bad at remembering keymaps: try integrating "which-key"!

[@MenemAbrazo]

I stopped using neovim 2 years ago because I couldn't find a proper way to port my setup to Lua. I've looked at a LOT of tutorials, looked at documentation, and I can say that this is by far the best explained and accessible tutorial or guide I've found on the internet. Amazing work. Thank you for this super series of videos.

[@AmexL]

Thank you for this tutorial. I've watch nearly a dozen and I found yours to be the most helpful, concise, and thorough.

[@sensor]

This is by far the best Neovim configuration resource of the whole Internet. TY!

[@Raubritterr222]

Incredibly helpful and awesome video instruction, thank you! I was willing to try using vim for development for some time now, but I was struggling with making my own setup and customizing it for my taste. I now understand much more about neovim setup and its inner works!

[@joseanmartinez]

Awesome! Thanks for the feedback, happy to hear it!

[@bishenpatel1676]

I don't normally have the habit of watching a full 1 hour video.. I tend to skip most parts... Yours is different... I sat down and watched this religiously.. Great work Josean... Keep the good work up.. Looking forward to see more contents from you...

[@joseanmartinez]

Wow! That means a lot. Really happy to hear you found the video interesting and enjoyed it! Thank you for your feedback and support🚀

[@erik.126]

I really appreciate your contribution. This help me a lots as a new guy to NVim

[@bretschuhmacher9144]

Great video, Josean! I've used vi/vim for years and am just coming to Neovim - you got me up and running with all your config files in git and your explanations were great! Now I just have to remember a whole new set of hotkeys! ;-)

[@Pikoro09]

Great video! I have a small suggestion, for the lspconfig set up, instead of making a config for each server it seems better to do: local servers = { ... } local nvim_lsp = require("lspconfig") for _, lsp in ipairs(servers) do nvim_lsp[lsp].setup({ capabilities = capabilities, on_attach = on_attach, }) end

[@bogdanp1351]

This was an amazing video and really well explained, congrats! I'd been struggling working with a hacky neovim config for a couple of weeks now, but then I found your video and the last few things I couldn't figure out before finally clicked. Thanks a lot!

[@dimitriskliros]

It would be fantastic to have a tutorial like this that is optimised for python

[@saysthetedd]

Just finished this whole thing. Stoked on my setup. Really appreciate your work man!

[@joseanmartinez]

Awesome!

[@user-by4kw1td7d]

This is so awesome. Man, you've done such a good job of explaining what's needed. I really appreciate it.

[@joseanmartinez]

Hey guys! This is no longer my most recent Neovim setup, I've updated the repo with my latest config with lazy.nvim: github.com/josean-dev/dev-environment-files. This video is still relevant and very useful for understanding how all of the most important plugins work and how to configure them. I've included a link in the description to the original code which is in a new branch in my repo. There might be breaking changes down the line. I’ll do my best to update the code in the github repo to fix any issues I find and also point out additional steps I had to take in the Readme. Here are a couple of things I've realized/fixed. You have to install ripgrep for some of the telescope features to work like live fuzzy finding text. Install it with homebrew by running: “brew install ripgrep”. In 1:08:13, there is something missing in the nvim-treesitter "run" function to make sure parsers are updated correctly. It's fixed in the repo. I also figured out what was wrong with installing nvim-ts-autotag in 1:08:41. Do this instead: "use({ "windwp/nvim-ts-autotag", after = "nvim-treesitter" })" to load the nvim-ts-autotag plugin after nvim-treesitter and fix the error. If you want to only enable eslint when there is an ".eslintrc.js" file in the root of your project, I've configured it that way in the repo. If you’re planning on using the typescript lsp like me, you’ll probably also need to install node. Finally, if you've updated to MacOS Ventura, you might also need to install XCode CLI tools with: "xcode-select --install". This will add "make" to your machine, which is necessary for the "telescope-fzf-native.nvim" plugin to install properly.

[@razzat3616]

you can also type ":luafile %" this will apply the changes without quitting the neovim, you won't have to exit everytime new changes are to be applied

[@joseanmartinez]

@@razzat3616 Hey! That’s interesting. I was trying something like this because I used to do something similar with Vim, but I was having issues with it because of caching from what I understand, so I just went about it by quitting and reopening. Thanks for the feedback!

[@djoezi3662]

How can I install node?

[@joseanmartinez]

@@djoezi3662 You can use homebrew on mac: “brew install node”

[@djoezi3662]

@@joseanmartinez Thank you Just continue!

[@djoezi3662]

Your teaching and explaining style is amazing! Thank you for being there! Also, there is one feature in vscode, when you write: div or h3 or whatever then . and class name then enter, gives you entire line and it makes writing code really fast. So, is there any chance to add this feature to nvim? It would be great! Thank you!

[@joseanmartinez]

Hey! Thanks for your feedback, really appreciate it! I believe you are referring to adding "emmet" functionality? I looked into it as it is a pretty good addition to the config and wanted to add it for my own use as well. It's now working and in the current version of the repository. There is an "emmet_ls" lsp that gives us this functionality, so I added this to the list of lsp servers in "mason.lua" and added a config for it in "lspconfig.lua". I'd check those two files out. With the current implementation of "nvim-cmp", when you write out something like say "div>p*3" for example, it'll be suggested in autocompletion as a snippet and you have to navigate to the option and press enter to use it. You could change this behavior in the "nvim-cmp.lua" by changing the "" mapping to "select = true" so that pressing enter automatically uses the first recommendation provided by "nvim-cmp" autocompletion. Let me know what you think! Hope that helps.

[@djoezi3662]

@@joseanmartinez It works like a charm. Thanks to your affords and time I code faster!! and we are waiting for a new video 🤩

[@theblowupdollsmusic]

This setup is so sick! Thank you for sharing your setup!

[@sebaplaza]

Really great video. The step by step style helped me to understand every configuration detail. I loved the way how your config is organized too. You're doing it great, keep on going !

[@joseanmartinez]

Thanks! Really appreciate the feedback!

[@nevzatseferoglu5391]

I don't suggest that making changes throughout the video asynchronously in your local. Just clone the repository and integrate it. It will really prevent your possible mistake which can be easily made by yourself. Thanks for the video! Awesome work!

[@neilkanakia]

Suggestion: Rather than constantly closing and reopening vim to source the file, you can set a command to source it for you Ex: keymap.set('n', 'vs', ':source $MYVIMRC') So when i hit leader vs it sources my vimrc

[@lle5159]

what is MYVIMRC in this case, or how can I inspect it?

[@BinarySmurf]

This is an absolutely fantastic video and you should be commended - I've completely configured neovim to my liking all thanks to you. Brilliant.

[@joseanmartinez]

I’m really happy to hear that! Thank you so much for your feedback, it means a lot. That’s really awesome you were able to configure it to your liking and set it up for your needs 🚀

[@mbrochh82]

dude this presentation style is amazing. and your terminal / vim setup is amazing as well.

[@joseanmartinez]

Thanks!

[@moritz2046]

average mac user

[@spondoolie6450]

This video needs more views IMO. I've been learning how to use nvim as my IDE from VSCode for weeks now, and a lot of other videos either don't explain everything as clearly or they basically customize a copy of NvChad. I have "rm -rf" my nvim folder so many times in the past few weeks until I watched this video and cloned the repo. I now have a way better understanding of what each and every part of the folder tree does so I can tailor my workflow and diagnose problems. So now you're my go-to nvim expert 💪

[@user-tt1ru8og2n]

Started using Neovim with your setup. Thank you for this tutorial!

[@FedericoReghini]

I'm having so much fun watching your videos and fallowing along. Thank you so much! 🙇!

[@hexcoreZz]

Josean, great video! Appreciate the time you took to put this together.

[@szenghoe]

Thanks for walk us through the entire process of nvim setup configuration!

[@jxnzxc]

Great job! I really like that guide. Yesterday I began my adventure with neovim. I absolutely love that, so excited! I discovered your channel today, but I'm sure I will stay longer.

[@joseanmartinez]

Awesome! That’s great to hear! Welcome to the world of Neovim and terminal based development, it’s been a worthy time investment in my own experience. Really appreciate your feedback!

[@taqueritovaquerito]

Thank you so much for making this tutorial with the git repo, it helped a lot for me getting into nvim

[@jonatansteuernagel1264]

This was very helpful! I have tried to configure Neovim so many times but I always failed with language servers. The plugin stack that you use here makes it insanely easy and I am so excited to start using it in my daily work!

[@joseanmartinez]

That is really great to hear! Thank you so much for your feedback!

[@jimymarletta7251]

Thanks a lot for this amazing video! That's a great opportunity to discover nvim with a cool and working setup

[@matejzajacik8496]

Very clearly explained, step by step, and a beautiful setup. Thank you!

[@ghsinfosec]

I recently had to re-image my laptop so I decided to reconfigure my nvim setup as well. Came across your videos and they're fantastic! Thanks for the thorough explanations on everything, excellent video!

[@joseanmartinez]

Hey! Thank you for your feedback, I really appreciate it! Glad you found the videos helpful!

[@ivanavilaalmanza]

Really appreciate this man. Thanks for sharing that amount of knowledge.

[@yourlinuxguy]

Really helpful video, going to use your repo to setup my first NVim. Thanks.

[@michaelstearns5323]

Outstanding Video Josean! Really appreciate this. So helpful.

[@aravindmaddini6348]

the whole playlist is hardwork ...keep it up bro amazing and thank you especially.......for organizing everything in order

[@jackelofnar]

Thank you for this tutorial as it has been exactly what I have been looking for. There are alot more plugins I want to install but you have given me the confidence that I can do this. great job

[@joseanmartinez]

Awesome! Happy to hear that.

[@utvikler-no]

I love this tutorial. I use vim at regular basis on external server, so i keep the setup small but just enough to make the programing bearable. Might just create a repo on this and start using nvim. Thanks❤

[@adriabruicortes490]

Wow! Just what I needed!!! What an amazing video. I'm also very eager to configure my terminal for multiple sessions, so I'll be following your other video aswell. Thank you very much!!!

[@joseanmartinez]

Awesome! Really happy to hear that! Thanks for your feedback! Glad I could help! The tmux video is up!

[@joseoviedo4529]

Great job Josean, I was able to complete the tutorial in about 2.5 hours! and I learned so much while doing it. I went from pretty much zero nvim experience to flying in and out of vim and the .config/nvim directory while I customized my neovim! thank again for all you do!

[@masudalimran92]

were you able to successfully install mason lsp's?

[@joseoviedo4529]

@@masudalimran92 yes, I was able to install every add on I wanted and I used a m2 Mac with arm64. All of the directions are executable.

[@masudalimran92]

@@joseoviedo4529 hmm. I had an issue earlier but got that fixed now. so its fine

[@gabriel-xc8hp]

Great stuff for beginners in NeoVIM. Thanks man!

[@podgorniy.r]

Thanks a million for the guide! Keep it all up please! The best tutorial for now

[@XiaochuanChen]

Thanks for such a great quality video. I really love it. It helped me to start configuring my neovim from zero.

[@SagarHingalAI]

pretty good video! didnt know we could do so much with the terminal ! Thanks for the info! will definitely try out 👍

[@EmileNani]

Hey thanks a lot for the walk through guide man. This helped me to try out neovim and setup my first rice which I am quite pleased with. Great job!

[@joseanmartinez]

Awesome! Glad I could help!

[@freddyvelarde3528]

This is the best step by step settings for neovim video that I've ever seen! great job, you got a new subscriber... :)

[@MrChubib0]

Thank you! this is one of the reason why I stop trying to use neovim because it's hard for beginners to setup but you nailed it. with great explanation is a plus!

[@joseanmartinez]

Happy to hear that! Really appreciate it.

[@ypucandeleteit]

amazing - this is the best thorough setup videon I've seen on youtube. Thank you!

[@jeantimex]

This is amazing! Finally I can set up an IDE with nvim + iterm2!!!

[@10thYugiohmaster10]

Dude this is actually beyond incredible, definitely stepping up my coding game with this

[@KuzyoYaroslav]

Like the setup. Just finished my setup, going to update to your structure - it makes a lot of sense to me.

[@joseanmartinez]

Awesome! Happy to hear that, thanks!

[@sudo_rm_vrf]

This video was an incredible guide, great job man.

[@kai_luck]

Thanks great job!!! I was confused about node in my terminal because I didn't install node. But, thanks to your comment, it worked!! Thanks

[@davelongdev]

Thanks for putting this together. I found it really helpful.

[@codicarlys]

Man! Congratulations to this sensational tutorial. Your are the best!

[@iAmTheWagon]

Absolutely the greatest neovim setup tutorial.

[@wagmcol]

such a good video. couldn't wait for this after watching your terminal setup video

[@joseanmartinez]

Really happy to hear that! Glad you enjoyed it!

[@alansibley8289]

Thank you! Thank you! I'm typing in each step and testing the features to see if I like them. What a great way to explore neovim. I'm sure this video was tricky to produce -- thank you! thank you! :)

[@joseanmartinez]

Awesome! Thanks for the feedback, really appreciate it!

[@Aditya-ne4lk]

seen many nvim configs, by far the best video.

[@alonso0188]

Thank you man, this is amazing. Really easy to follow.

[@MrAbuYT]

Thank you so much for this guide. It is really helpful.

[@timelesscoding]

Great stuff, I follwed your video and have set up everything by your recommendation, it works 👍

[@AlbertArvidsson]

Wow! I want almost all of this. I have stuggled with setting up formatters properly and generally been using (n)vim without that many plugins for a very long time. Excited to take some time to try this setup.

[@joseanmartinez]

Awesome!

[@dessasin4142]

Finally! I found a perfectly working config without errors. Thanks mate.

[@joseanmartinez]

Awesome!

[@seftyyunitasari7623]

It took me quite a while to follow the video, but it's all worth it. My nvim looks awesome now, I like it. Thank you so much! 😊

[@joseanmartinez]

That’s awesome! Thanks for the feedback, happy to hear that! In general, setting up Nevoim can be a time consuming and tedious process. It took me a lot of hours of research to put this setup and video together originally so the hope for the video was to put the information in one place. Hopefully now you’ll be able to understand how everything works together and continue to evolve the setup into your own thing into the future!

[@neodinok-it3ym]

Thanks a lot, exactly what i was looking for

[@MrMagnezone18]

Thanx for this video, was better than expected I was thinking about move to lua and your video is the perfect tutorial. I say it again: you are awesome!

[@joseanmartinez]

Thanks man! Happy to hear it!

[@user-mv1bh6lo4g]

Unbelievable. Nice work. Thank you!

[@lennyedwards62]

made it to the end, got it all working. Great vid, great style. Keep making content. Thanks and best wishes

[@joseanmartinez]

Awesome, thanks!

[@Geekyology]

This is simply the best video on the topic. I have seen alot and this guy simply tops them all.

[@joseanmartinez]

I really appreciate that, thanks for your feedback!

[@synen]

This was an amazing video, with so much detail and information, omg thank you so much.

[@joseanmartinez]

Really happy to hear you enjoyed it and found it helpful. Thanks for the feedback!

[@subbunittala2012]

Just awesome bro with clarity ....and articulation and explanation is top notch !

[@joseanmartinez]

Really appreciate it!

[@volzokokey507]

Thank you so much for your setup videos. It's improve my work :)

[@jprao123]

Great video on neovim. Thanks for sharing. 🙏🏼

[@FastTypingGuy]

I have been a long-time user of Vim, but after discovering Neovim's Lua configs, I felt a bit out of practice. This tutorial helped me regain my footing and update my config, thank you.

[@joseanmartinez]

Awesome! Happy to hear that.

[@Adambd99]

Amazing job! best LSP tutorial to date

[@juancarloshernandez2545]

thank you for the excellent video, from now on I am your follower!

[@ugolafosse3267]

Incredible Setup, very well thought through video, your method of explaining is gold thank you very much.

[@joseanmartinez]

Awesome, thanks!

[@itstimuism]

thanks! this was very helpful in moving from vscode

[@robot01001]

This video helped me a ton, thank you so much!

[@bhavdippathar003]

Thank you so much for this very informative video, Josean, and by the way your explanation was excellent. I found it to be very informative, even though it is long. I would like to thank you again for your diligent work. I'll watch your next video on Tmux With Neovim. It will be a pleasure to keep watching your upcoming videos.

[@joseanmartinez]

Thanks!!