# Vimium

29 Hacker News commenters recommended Vimium and 4 criticized it, November 2025 to November 2026. It was recommended in 10 of 13 months. It meets the Hacker Approved badge rule.

**Verdict:** Brings vi-style keyboard navigation to any website, so links are clicked by key instead of mouse. Critics find it limited.

## Why people recommend it

- Click links by key, not mouse (5 comments): "it's such a productivity booster, especially the ability to navigate links without pointing at them to click" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49485200)) "Push a button, every icon is now labeled with a key, type that key, counts as a click, done." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49483925)) "Vimium gives me a keyboard-centric interface to help avoid mouse usage" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48909499))
- Good for keyboard-driven workflows (4 comments): "using the keyboard for navigation, while it sounds like a chore, is really quite excellent" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47501992)) "It made my sentiments very much favour keyboard-driven workflows" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49483511)) "vimium is awesome. i'm getting used to it now." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49881719))
- Vi-style keys work across websites (3 comments): "it's following the vi logic across websites, rather than having to learn everyone's idea of how to navigate" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49484238)) "Vim controls really found their way into my muscle memory through Tridactyl and Vimium" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48756945)) "Vimium is just very fun to use, especially if you're using Vim/Neovim/Helix" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46213763))
- Makes browsing faster and more productive (2 comments): "it's such a productivity booster" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49485214)) "it makes me so much faster" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49019894))

## What people warn about

- Feels limited to some users (3 comments): "as I was unhappy with other tools (vimium, shortcat etc)" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48918986)) "found Tridactyl and Vimium to be frustratingly limited" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46198689)) "found Vimium very limited" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46196377))

## Alternatives hackers recommend

- [Unhook](https://hackerapproved.com/p/unhook.md): 48 recommend
- [SingleFile](https://hackerapproved.com/p/singlefile.md): 34 recommend
- [Sidebery](https://hackerapproved.com/p/sidebery.md): 27 recommend
- [Redirector Firefox extension](https://hackerapproved.com/p/redirector-browser-extension.md): 24 recommend
- [Tree Style Tab](https://hackerapproved.com/p/tree-style-tab.md): 23 recommend

## Cite as

Hacker Approved, "Vimium", https://hackerapproved.com/p/vimium/ (counts from 1,795,640 Hacker News comments, November 2025 to November 2026).