Do you find the cursor all right without having it blink at (and in) your face? Find the blinking more irritating than useful? Find out here how to disable cursor blinking in Emacs (with a graphical user interface and on the console).
First, Open the Window and Put Out Your Arm
You’d open the window, of course, and put out your arm, either straight or pointing up, in early automobiles: indicating a turn was a literally brachial affair.
Soon, the human arm was replaced with a mechanical one acting much like a semaphore. To make it more visible, the arm received a small light—and then collapsed into that light, which, lamentably, started to blink like a nervously ill-behaved editor cursor.
With that in mind, want to return Emacs to the halcyon days of the Barrachini warning apparatus:
How to Disable Cursor Blinking in Emacs
Emacs Using a Graphical User Interface
Time needed: 3 minutes
To turn off cursor blinking in Emacs using a graphical user interface (such as Linux with Gnome and KDE, macOS or Windows):
- Open customization for the variable blink-cursor-mode in Emacs.
Here’s how: Press Meta X in Emacs, type
customize-variableand press Enter.
Using the menu: You can also select Options | Customize Emacs | Specific Option… from the menu. - Type
blink-cursor-modeon the Emacs command line (minibuffer) under Customize variable:.
- Press Enter.
- Click Toggle for Blink Cursor Mode so the option is off (nil).
What this does: This turns off cursor blinking altogether, including the 5 blinks Emacs displays by default before showing the cursor permanently; see below for modifying that blinking count.
- Now click Apply and Save.
Just for now: You can, of course, also select Apply instead to turn the blinking off only for the current session (while it will start blinking again when you close and re-open Emacs).
Also using Emacs Friendly Keymap? How to Disable Cursor Blinking in Visual Studio Code
Turning Off Cursor Blinking in Terminal Emacs
To prevent the cursor from blinking if you use Emacs in a text-only console environment:
- Turn off cursor blinking in the console itself.
- Open your Emacs configuration file.
Here’s how: Runemacs ~/.emacson the console. - Add the following line to the file:
(setq visible-cursor nil) - Save the file and exit Emacs.
Here’s how: Press Ctrl X Ctrl C, then press Y to save.
How to Disable Cursor Blinking in Emacs: FAQ
Can I also change the blinking frequency?
Yes.
To change the blinking frequency in Emacs with a graphical user interface:
- Change the
blink-cursor-intervalvariable.
Here’s how: Set the value either in the Emacs customizer or directly in the ~/.emacs file.
Here’s what it does: The variable sets the blinking interval in seconds, i.e., a value of 1 has the cursor blink once per second, 0.2 five times per second, and the default value of 0.5 sets the cursor to blinking two times per second (every 500 ms).
Example:(setq blink-cursor-interval 0.7)
Can I make the cursor blink just once?
Yes.
To make the cursor in Emacs (on a graphical user interface) blink once after editing, then stop (and show continuously):
- Change the
blink-cursor-blinksvariable.
Here’s what this does: The variable specifies how often the cursor blinks before stopping.
Continuous blinking: Set the variable to 0 to have the cursor in Emacs blink continuously.
Example:(setq blink-cursor-blinks 1)
(How to disable cursor blinking tested with Emacs 29.4; first published April 2025)