Introduction to Nano Editor

Using Nano Editor

How to Select All in the Nano Text Editor

In this quick Nano tip, learn about selecting all the text of a file.

Want to select all text in the nano text editor? All you have to do is follow 3 simple steps:

  1. Press Alt + \ to jump to the beginning of the file
  2. Now press Ctrl + 6 to set the mark
  3. Finally, press Alt + / to go to the end of the line

Yes, that's all it takes to select all text in the nano text editor.

Want detailed steps? You got it.

Select all in the nano text editor

There is no built-in keyboard shortcut for selecting all the text in Nano.

Instead, you have to go to the beginning of the file, then set the mark to the beginning of the file.

As you have set the mark to the beginning of the file you can use arrow keys to make a selection but that's not the most practical way to do it.

So you use a shortcut to jump to the end of the file which will select everything from the beginning to the end of the file.

Pretty easy. Right?

Step 1: Go to the beginning of the file

To jump to the beginning of the line, press the Alt + / shortcut:

Jump to the beginning of the file in nano text editor

Alternatively, you can also press Ctrl + Home key to go to the beginning of the file.

Step 2: Set the marker

Once you reach the beginning of the file, you have to set the mark that tells Nano that you want to make a selection from that point.

To set the marker, simply press Ctrl + 6 and you will see the mark is set:

Set mark in the nano text editor

Sure, you can use the arrow keys to select multiple lines but if the file is long, it won't make any sense.

Jumping to the end of the file using a shortcut is a good idea.

Step 3: Jump to the end of the file

Once you mark the point at the beginning of the file, you can press Alt + / to jump to the end of the file and as the marker was set, it will select lines till the end of the file:

Select all in the nano text editor

That's it!

Want to learn Nano? I got you!

If you are a beginner and want to learn all the basics of the Nano text editor then I have good news for you.

We made a detailed beginner guide to the nano text editor:

Editing Files With Nano in Linux [With Cheat Sheet]
Though Nano is less complicated to use than Vim and Emacs, it doesn’t mean Nano cannot be overwhelming. Learn how to use the Nano text editor.
It's FOSSAbhishek Prakash

I hope you will find this guide helpful.