Essential Linear Keyboard Shortcuts & Key Bindings Guide

Linear’s standout feature is its "keyboard-first" design, which lets you handle almost every workflow without ever touching your mouse.

Once you master these shortcuts, you'll be able to manage projects and issues at incredible speed, unlocking the app's true potential.

General Shortcuts

Let's start with the essential global shortcuts, which mostly rely on the Cmd/Ctrl key.

You'll want to memorize these three foundational actions: the Command Menu (Cmd/Ctrl + K) to access almost any feature or setting, Search (/) to quickly scan across projects, issues, and documents, and "ESC" to close modals.

If your goal is to truly master Linear's shortcuts, your very first step should be learning the Help command (? or Cmd/Ctrl + /), which brings up the complete cheat sheet.

Views & Navigation

Next, mastering how to navigate between projects, cycles, and team backlogs is an absolute must.

Once you're comfortable toggling between list and board views with a single keystroke (Cmd/Ctrl + B), it's time to learn Linear's unique 'G' (Go to) and 'O' (Open) shortcut sequences.

These work by pressing a starting key followed immediately by a second key.

For example, to navigate around your workspace, press 'G then I' for your Inbox, 'G then M' for My Issues, and 'G then V' for the current Cycle.

It might feel a bit unintuitive at first, but once you get the hang of the G and O sequences, you'll rarely need to click the sidebar again.

It's honestly not a bad idea to shift your home row position to rest your left index finger on 'G' and your right on 'O' while you're in the app.

Issue Management

Creating, triaging, and updating issues is the core of your day-to-day work in Linear.

You can intuitively open modification dialogs with a single keystroke: press 'C' to instantly create a new issue from anywhere. For an existing issue, press 'S' to change its status, 'A' to assign it, 'I' to assign it to yourself, or 'P' to update its priority.

Similar to the G and O sequences, Linear also features unique 'M' (Mark) shortcuts. If you find yourself using these actions frequently, they are definitely worth memorizing.

By combining these issue commands with Peek previews and basic keyboard navigation through lists, you can organize and manage a massive backlog at blistering speeds.

However, because these shortcuts are mapped to the first letter of the English word for the action, they aren't always arranged in the most ergonomic layout. If you manage a massive number of issues every day, you might actually find it easier to map these commands to a dedicated macro pad.

Editor & Formatting

These shortcuts let you quickly create and format rich text in issue descriptions, comments, and Linear Documents.

They generally follow a standard pattern: Cmd/Ctrl + the first letter of the formatting type, occasionally throwing Shift into the mix.

You probably won't use these quite as often as the others. Unless your primary job involves writing a massive amount of documentation in the editor, you can safely save these for last.