title: Snippets - Zed description: Create and use code snippets in Zed with tab stops, placeholders, variables, and language-scoped triggers.

Snippets

Use the {#action snippets::ConfigureSnippets} action to create a new snippets file or edit an existing snippets file for a specified scope.

The snippets are located in ~/.config/zed/snippets directory to which you can navigate with the {#action snippets::OpenFolder} action.

Example configuration

{
  // Each snippet must have a name and body, but the prefix and description are optional.
  // The prefix is used to trigger the snippet, but when omitted then the name is used.
  // Use placeholders like $1, $2 or ${1:defaultValue} to define tab stops.
  // The $0 determines the final cursor position.
  // Placeholders with the same value are linked.
  // If the snippet contains the $ symbol outside of a placeholder, it must be escaped with two slashes (e.g. \\$var).
  "Log to console": {
    "prefix": "log",
    "body": ["console.info(\"Hello, ${1:World}!\")", "$0"],
    "description": "Logs to console"
  }
}

Scopes

The scope is determined by the language name in lowercase e.g. python.json for Python, shell script.json for Shell Script, but there are some exceptions to this rule:

To create JSX snippets you have to use javascript.json snippets file, instead of jsx.json, but this does not apply to TSX and TypeScript which follow the above rule.

Path separators (/ and \) are removed from the file name, so a language named PL/X uses plx.json.

Known Limitations

• Only the first prefix is used when a list of prefixes is passed in.
• Currently only the json snippet file format is supported.