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Ripgrep

ripgrep (rg)

ripgrep, often called rg, is a fast command-line search tool for text inside files.

Think of it as grep on steroids—it searches recursively, is super fast, and respects .gitignore by default.

Why Developers Use ripgrep

  • Quickly search through codebases for strings or patterns
  • Faster than grep, especially for large projects
  • Respects .gitignore, so you don’t get spam from ignored files
  • Integrates nicely with fzf or other terminal tools for workflow

Basic Usage

rg "search_term"
  • Searches for "search_term" in current directory and subdirectories
  • Example: Find all occurrences of TODO in a project:
rg TODO

Common Options

Option Description Example
-i Ignore case rg -i todo
-v Invert match rg -v debug
-w Match whole words rg -w function
-n Show line numbers rg -n TODO
--files List all files (like fd) rg --files
-g Include/exclude patterns rg -g '*.py' TODO

Examples

  1. Search for main in Python files only:
rg -g "*.py" main
  1. Search ignoring case:
rg -i "function"
  1. Show line numbers for matches:
rg -n "TODO"
  1. Combine with fzf for interactive search:
rg --files | fzf
  • Search through all project files interactively.

Advanced Use

  • Preview matches with bat:
rg TODO | fzf --preview 'bat --style=numbers --color=always {}'
  • Use in scripts to automatically find and replace text.
  • Integrates with Neovim/LazyVim for fast in-editor search.