ripgrep: Not Just a Faster grep, but a Sharper One

When you think ripgrep (rg), you probably think "fast regex search tool."

But what makes it seriously lethal is how much you can control its behavior with fine-grained options.

VS Code? It internally uses ripgrep for its file search.

If you tweak ripgrep, you're basically tweaking a search engine level tool.

Let's slice deep into 10 seriously useful ripgrep options and why they matter.

1. -F / --fixed-strings

Treat your search pattern as a literal string, not a regex.

Useful when: You don't want your . or * or () being treated as regex syntax.

Example:

rg -F "user.name" ./src

No regex engine overhead. It’s faster.

2. -g / --glob

Include/exclude files manually.

Useful when: You want to surgically search only .ts files, or exclude node_modules.

Examples:

rg -g "*.ts"
rg -g "!node_modules/**"

Want case-insensitive globbing? Use --glob-case-insensitive.

3. -U / --multiline

Match patterns that span across multiple lines.

Useful when: You're trying to find multiline JSON fields, big HTML tags, broken SQL queries.

Example:

rg -U '"description":\s*"([^"]|\n)*?"' ./configs

When one line isn't enough — -U is your buddy.

4. -P / --pcre2

Use PCRE2 (Perl Compatible Regular Expressions) engine.

Useful when: You need crazy powerful regex features like lookaheads, lookbehinds, atomic groups, etc.

Example:

rg -P "(?<=error_code: )\d+" logs/

Without -P, ripgrep's default engine won't support lookbehinds.

5. -A, -B, -C

Show lines after, before, or around a match.

Useful when: You want surrounding context, not just isolated matching lines.

Examples:

rg -C 3 "panic:" ./backend
rg -A 5 "Traceback" ./logs

Makes your search results feel story-like instead of fragmented.

6. -l / --files-with-matches

Only print filenames that have at least one match.

Useful when: You're building file lists (for further scripting), not inspecting contents.

Example:

rg -l "TODO" ./src | xargs vim

(VS Code does a version of this under the hood when showing "files with results".)

7. -o / --only-matching

Print only the matching text, not the whole line.

Useful when: You want just emails, IDs, tags, etc.

Example:

rg -o -P "\b[A-Za-z0-9._%+-]+@[A-Za-z0-9.-]+\.[A-Z|a-z]{2,}\b" ./emails.txt

Think: turning a noisy search into a clean data extraction tool.

8. --json

Output matches in JSON lines format.

Useful when: You want machine-readable results (for piping into scripts, or UIs).

Example:

rg --json "error" ./logs | jq .

VS Code search runs a variation of this to parse results live.

9. --type / --type-not / --type-add

Search specific file types or define your own.

Useful when: Built-in file type matching isn't enough.

Examples:

rg --type js "use strict"
rg --type-not css "container"
rg --type-add 'proto:*.proto' --type proto "service"

You can extend ripgrep's world. Define your own "languages".

10. -r / --replace

Replace matched text directly, like sed, but faster.

Useful when: You want to find and replace across massive projects.

Example:

rg -r "Product" "product" ./docs

Case-sensitive mass edits in seconds. Be careful — there’s no undo.

Why ripgrep Stomps Everything

• Insanely parallel (multi-threaded)
• Gitignore respecting (unless you tell it otherwise)
• PCRE2 fallback if you need heavy regex
• Speed comparable to tools that only list filenames

VS Code searched 10,000+ files? You bet ripgrep was sweating under the hood, not grep, not ack, not ag.

Bonus Moves

• --smart-case (-S):
  
  If pattern has uppercase, do case-sensitive search. Otherwise, case-insensitive.
  
  No need to think manually.

• --files:
  
  Just list files ripgrep would search, without searching.
  
  (great for dry-runs)

• --hidden:
  
  Include hidden files and dirs (.git, .env) without ignoring them.

• --no-ignore:
  
  Blast through .gitignore, .ignore, .rgignore, and search EVERYTHING.

• --vimgrep:
  
  Format output compatible with Vim/Neovim quickfix lists.

Deep Dive: Multiline Search in ripgrep

One place where beginners trip up: ripgrep is line-oriented by default.

If your pattern spans across multiple lines (for example, matching from orange to kiwi inside a text block), rg won't find it unless you explicitly tell it to.

Why your search might fail:

• . doesn't match \n by default in regex.

Fix #1: Use --multiline + (?s) flag inside the pattern

• (?s) makes the dot . match newlines too.

rg -U '(?s)orange.*kiwi'

Fix #2: Use --multiline + --multiline-dotall

• No need to modify the regex, just allow dot to match newlines globally.

rg -U --multiline-dotall 'orange.*kiwi'

Shortcut:

• -U is shorthand for --multiline.
• Best to always prefer -U '(?s)pattern' for short searches.

Summary

TL;DR

ripgrep’s real power isn't just that it finds text fast —

it’s that you can slice, shape, color, invert, filter, extract, or replace what you find at the speed of thought.

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