Keyboard Shortcuts

Renoise features an enormous amount of keyboard shortcuts, but in the previous topics we often only noted a few of the important ones. Besides those, there are many other shortcuts available and even unassigned shortcuts, which you can customise yourself if they fit well into your work-flow.

Keyboard Focus Concept

Renoise utilises a shortcut Focus system for the keyboard, which means that most keyboard shortcuts only apply to a specific region in the interface. We will refer to those as local. Other shortcuts apply to all regions and we will refer to them as global.

The currently focused area in Renoise is surrounded with small orange corners:

File:Vvoois renoise focus checkmarks.png

To change the Focus area, you can either:

Click anywhere in Renoise with the middle-mouse button.
Left-click anywhere in Renoise while holding down the "Alt" key.
Right-click anywhere in Renoise and choose "(Set Keyboard Focus Here)" from the context menu.
Use the shortcuts "Control/Command + TAB" or "Control/Command + Shift + TAB".

Here is a small example on how to use the Focus:

When you start up Renoise, the Pattern Editor is focused by default. If you use the arrow keys then the Pattern Editor's cursor will start moving around. Now left-click somewhere in the Disk Browser while holding down the "Alt" key, which will set the Focus to the Disk Browser. Notice that the orange corners now surround the Disk Browser and the arrow keys move around to select files and folders.

The idea behind this is that the main components of Renoise (such as the Pattern Editor) should always be ready for editing. The keyboard Focus should not move loosely around, unless you want it to. If you want it to, you can change it via the "View->Lock Keyboard Focus" option in the Upper Status Bar.

Customising and Printing Shortcuts

Using the menu panel "Edit->Preferences->Keys", you can customise any keyboard shortcut and also print out a list of the currently set shortcuts. To print the shortcuts, simply click the File:Vvoois renoise preferences keys print.png button in this dialog:

File:Vvoois renoise preferences keys.png

List of Default Shortcuts

For convenience, here are the default shortcuts for all three platforms that run Renoise:

Windows: Default Shortcuts for Windows
Mac OS X: Default Shortcuts for OS X
Linux: Default Shortcuts on Linux

List of Important Shortcuts

Below is a list of the most commonly used keyboard shortcuts (Mac users: Replace "Control" with "Command" and "Alt" with "Option" below):

Renoise also supports most of the common shortcuts that apply to any application: "Control + X" (Cut), "Control + C" (Copy), "Control + V" (Paste), "Control + Z" (Undo), "Control + Y" (Redo).

Global

Panel Switching

F1, F2, F3, F4, F5, F6, F7, F8: Activate Window Layout Presets

Tip: You can save and customise the layouts by right-clicking on the 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8 buttons at the top right of the Renoise interface. The current keyboard Focus is also saved with the preset.

Play and Record

Space: Start/Stop playing.
Enter: Only play the line directly under the cursor (play step by step).
Right Alt: Start playing and looping the current pattern.
Right Control: Start playing the song.
Right Shift: Start playing the song with Edit Mode enabled.
Escape: Toggle Edit Mode.
Numpad Enter: Activate Block Loop and start playing.

Instruments

Numpad / *: Decrease/increase keyboard octave.
Numpad - +: Decrease/increase instrument slot selection.
Numpad 1-9: Select instrument from instruments visible in the Instrument Selector.
Alt + Left/Right Arrow Keys: Jump up/down a page in the Instrument Selector.
Alt + Up/Down Arrow Keys: Select previous/next instrument.

Pattern Editor

Edit Step & Navigation

Control & - +: Decrease/increase the Edit Step value.
Control & 1-0: Set the edit step number.
Control & Shift & 1-0: Set note quantize amount.
Arrow Keys: Navigate through the Pattern Editor.
PageUp/PageDown: Move up/down in pattern.
Home/End: Go to start/end line of pattern.
F9: Move cursor to line 0.
F10: Move cursor 25% of the way down the pattern.
F11: Move cursor to the centre of the pattern.
F12: Move cursor 75% of the way down the pattern.

Note-Off

Caps-Lock: Insert Note-Off when Edit Mode is enabled.

Cut/Copy/Paste

Control + X: Cut selection to clipboard.
Control + C: Copy selection to clipboard.
Control + V: Paste contents from clipboard to target.
Backspace: Delete all notes and effect commands at the current line in the track and scroll everything beneath the current line up.
Insert: Insert clean row into track and push all notes and effects in current track down.
Control + Shift + Delete: Delete note under cursor and scroll column beneath current note up.
Control + Shift + Insert: Insert clean row into column and push all data in current column down.
Control + Shift + Left/Right arrow: Remove/add note or effect column.

Shift + F3: Cut current track.
Shift + F4: Copy current track.
Shift + F5: Paste current track.
Control + F3: Cut current pattern.
Control + F4: Copy current pattern.
Control + F5: Paste current pattern.
Alt + F3: Cut current selection in pattern.
Alt + F4: Copy current selection in pattern.
Alt + F5: Paste current selection in pattern.

Pattern Sequencer

Control + Left/Right Arrow Keys: Change number of current pattern.
Control + Up/Down Arrow Keys: Move to prev/next pattern in sequence.
Control + Home: Go to first pattern in sequence.
Control + End: Go to last pattern in sequence.
Control + Insert: Insert new pattern into sequence.
Control + Delete: Delete current pattern in sequence.