Overwrite using vim with nvim

tl;dr

• update-alternatives if you’re using Linux.
• Create symlink named vim which points to nvim in your ~/.local/bin/.
• Create an alias for nvim titled vim in your .aliases file.

update-alternatives

If you’re using Linux, this is the most straightforward way to do it. Linux has a tool titled update-alternatives that will safely create a symlink to replace another command.

I’d recommend you check out the tldr page for update-alternatives, or do a quick search to find how it works.

To use nvim in favor of vim:

sudo update-alternatives $(which vim) vim $(which nvim) 100

To use nvim in favor of vi:

sudo update-alternatives $(which vi) vi $(which nvim) 100

~/.local/bin override

One increasingly popular way to install binaries locally (or override existing ones) is to have a ~/.local/bin directory. Most operating systems now will support this, but if not – just add it to your $PATH.

The following is how I went about using this approach:

ln -s $(which nvim) ~/.local/bin/vim

aliasing

You can also just add an alias to your .aliases file (or any of your shell configuration files):

alias vim=nvim