The Settings Editor provides a convenient visual interface, directly editing the settings.json file offers more advanced control and is essential for certain customizations. settings.json files are plain text files formatted in JSON (JavaScript Object Notation).

Accessing settings.json

• Settings Editor: In the Settings Editor, click the “Open Settings (JSON)” icon in the top-right corner. This will open the settings.json file for the currently selected scope (User or Workspace).
• Command Palette: Open the Command Palette (Ctrl+Shift+P or Cmd+Shift+P) and run “Preferences: Open Settings (JSON)“. This opens the User settings.json. To open Workspace settings.json, run “Preferences: Open Workspace Settings (JSON)“.

Depending on your platform, the user settings file is located here:

• Windows %APPDATA%\Code\User\settings.json
• macOS $HOME/Library/Application\ Support/Code/User/settings.json
• Linux $HOME/.config/Code/User/settings.json

JSON Syntax and Schema

{
	"editor.fontSize": 14,
	"editor.fontFamily": "Fira Code",
	"editor.lineHeight": 22,
	"workbench.colorTheme": "Dracula",
	"files.autoSave": "afterDelay",
	"files.autoSaveDelay": 1000,
	"editor.tabSize": 2,
	"editor.insertSpaces": true,
	"editor.detectIndentation": false,
	"files.exclude": {
		"**/.git": true,
		"**/.svn": true,
		"**/.hg": true,
		"**/CVS": true,
		"**/.DS_Store": true,
		"**/node_modules": true
	},
	"explorer.confirmDelete": false,
	"terminal.integrated.fontSize": 13,
	"terminal.integrated.fontFamily": "monospace",
	"editor.wordWrap": "on",
	"editor.minimap.enabled": false
}

Advanced Configuration with settings.json

Comments: While JSON itself doesn’t support comments, Visual Studio Code settings.json allows single-line (//) and multi-line (/* … */) comments for documentation and notes.

Conditional Settings: You can use language-specific settings within settings.json to apply configurations only to certain languages. For example:

{
	"[python]": {
		"editor.tabSize": 4,
		"editor.insertSpaces": true,
		"python.linting.pylintEnabled": true
	},
	"[javascript]": {
		"editor.tabSize": 2,
		"editor.insertSpaces": true
	}
}

This example sets tabSize to 4 and enables pylint for Python files, while setting tabSize to 2 for JavaScript files. The language identifier (e.g., python, javascript) is enclosed in square brackets []. You can find language identifiers in the Language Mode selector in the bottom-right corner of Visual Studio Code.

Array and Object Settings: Settings that are arrays or objects are often easier to configure directly in settings.json. For instance, the files.exclude setting, which is an object, is typically modified in settings.json to add or remove file patterns to exclude from the Explorer.

Scripting and Automation: settings.json files can be programmatically generated or modified, enabling scripting and automation of Visual Studio Code configuration. This can be useful for setting up consistent development environments across teams or for dynamically adjusting settings based on scripts or environment variables.