Language-specific indentation settings in VS Code

This post is over three years old. Some of it may no longer reflect current tooling or my current view.

When I’m working with Python I like four space indents, but for JavaScript or HTML I like two space indents.

Today I figured out how to teach VS Code those defaults.

Hit Shift+Command+P to bring up the action menu
Search for the Preferences: Configure Language Specific Settings... item
Select the language, e.g. HTML or Python
Add "editor.tabSize": 2 to the corresponding JSON object
Save that file

I ended up with the following in my JSON (plus a bunch of other stuff I’ve edited out):

{
    "[html]": {
        "editor.tabSize": 2,
        "editor.defaultFormatter": "esbenp.prettier-vscode"
    },
    "[javascript]": {
        "editor.defaultFormatter": "esbenp.prettier-vscode",
        "editor.tabSize": 2
    },
    "[typescript]": {
        "editor.defaultFormatter": "esbenp.prettier-vscode",
        "editor.tabSize": 2
    },
    "[python]": {
        "editor.tabSize": 4,
        "editor.wordBasedSuggestions": false
    }
}

This file is stored on my machine at ~/Library/Application Support/Code/User/settings.json.

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