CSI erase and edit

Status: Standard (ECMA-48) with DEC selective-erase variants and one xterm extension.

Erase commands clear cells in place. Edit commands insert or delete cells or rows and shift the rest. Both are bounded by the scrolling region and, when enabled, the left/right margins.

Erase

Name	Sequence	Ps	Effect
ED	CSI Ps J	0	From cursor to end of screen (default)
		1	From start of screen to cursor, inclusive
		2	Entire screen; cursor does not move
		3	Scrollback only (xterm extension); the visible screen is untouched
EL	CSI Ps K	0	From cursor to end of line (default)
		1	From start of line to cursor, inclusive
		2	Entire line
ECH	CSI Ps X	1	Erase Ps cells from the cursor; no shifting

Erased cells receive the current background color in every modern emulator, following xterm's "background color erase" (terminfo bce). Older behavior erased to the default background. Applications that rely on bce to paint regions should check the capability or paint spaces explicitly.

ED 2 does not move the cursor and does not clear scrollback. clear(1) sends ED 2 then ED 3 when the terminfo entry has E3; applications should not assume ED 3 exists. On the alternate screen ED 3 is a no-op almost everywhere because there is no scrollback.

Selective erase

CSI Ps " q     DECSCA: 1 = protect, 0 or 2 = unprotect subsequent characters
CSI ? Ps J     DECSED: like ED, but skips protected cells
CSI ? Ps K     DECSEL: like EL, but skips protected cells

DECSCA sets a per-cell protection attribute. Support is common in DEC-faithful emulators (xterm, WezTerm, Ghostty, foot, Contour) and absent elsewhere; consult the terminal page before use.

Edit

Name	Sequence	Default	Effect
ICH	CSI Ps @	1	Insert Ps blank cells at the cursor; the rest of the row shifts right and falls off the right margin
DCH	CSI Ps P	1	Delete Ps cells at the cursor; the row shifts left and blanks enter from the right margin
IL	CSI Ps L	1	Insert Ps blank rows at the cursor row; rows below shift down and fall off the bottom margin
DL	CSI Ps M	1	Delete Ps rows at the cursor row; rows below shift up and blanks enter at the bottom margin
REP	CSI Ps b	1	Repeat the last printed character Ps times

IL and DL apply only when the cursor is inside the scrolling region; outside it they are ignored. Both move the cursor to the left margin in DEC terminals and in xterm; a few emulators leave the column unchanged, so applications should follow IL/DL with an explicit CHA.

ICH and DCH operate on the current row only and respect left/right margins when ?69 is set. Inserting into a row that contains a wide character at the boundary splits it; emulators replace the orphaned half with a space.

Insert mode (CSI 4 h, IRM) makes ordinary printing behave like ICH before each character. Almost nothing uses it, but full-screen libraries reset it defensively.

Wide characters and erase

Erasing one half of a wide character erases both halves in most emulators; the wide cell cannot exist without its spacer. Whether the surviving neighbor becomes a space or is left untouched varies. Applications that erase columns precisely should erase whole grapheme runs.

Probe

printf 'abcdefgh\r\033[2@' ; sleep 1; printf '\n'      # ICH 2: expect "  abcdefgh" clipped
printf 'abcdefgh\r\033[3P' ; sleep 1; printf '\n'      # DCH 3: expect "defgh"
printf 'abcdefgh\r\033[4b\n'                            # REP after CR repeats "h"
printf '\033[3J'                                        # clear scrollback only

Sources

• ECMA-48 §8.3
• XTerm Control Sequences
• VT510 DECSCA
• terminfo(5), bce and E3

Compatibility

Feature support by terminal. Imported claims have not been reverified; unknown is not unsupported.

Feature / stable ID	Alacritty	Apple Terminal	ConPTY (conhost)	Contour	DomTerm	foot	Ghostty	iTerm2	kitty	Konsole	mintty	mlterm	PuTTY	Revenant	RLogin	st	tmux	rxvt-unicode	VTE	wayst	WezTerm	Windows Terminal	xterm	xterm.js
ED/EL/ECH/ICH/DCH/IL/DL csi-editing-operations	SupportedImported · unverified	SupportedImported · unverified	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	SupportedImported · unverified	SupportedImported · unverified	SupportedImported · unverified	SupportedImported · unverified	SupportedImported · unverified	Unknown	Unknown	SupportedImported · unverified	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	SupportedImported · unverified	Unknown	SupportedImported · unverified	Unknown	SupportedImported · unverified	SupportedImported · unverified	SupportedImported · unverified	SupportedImported · unverified
ED 3 (scrollback) csi-3-j-erase-scrollback	SupportedImported · unverified	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	SupportedImported · unverified	SupportedImported · unverified	SupportedImported · unverified	SupportedImported · unverified	SupportedImported · unverified	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	SupportedImported · unverified	Unknown	SupportedImported · unverified	Unknown	SupportedImported · unverified	SupportedImported · unverified	SupportedImported · unverified	SupportedImported · unverified
bce terminfo-bce	SupportedImported · unverified	SupportedImported · unverified	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	SupportedImported · unverified	SupportedImported · unverified	SupportedImported · unverified	SupportedImported · unverified	SupportedImported · unverified	Unknown	Unknown	SupportedImported · unverified	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	SupportedImported · unverified	Unknown	SupportedImported · unverified	Unknown	SupportedImported · unverified	SupportedImported · unverified	SupportedImported · unverified	SupportedImported · unverified
DECSCA/DECSED/DECSEL dec-selective-erase	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	SupportedImported · unverified	SupportedImported · unverified	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	SupportedImported · unverified	Unknown	SupportedImported · unverified	PartialImported · unverified
REP csi-rep	SupportedImported · unverified	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	SupportedImported · unverified	SupportedImported · unverified	Unknown	SupportedImported · unverified	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	SupportedImported · unverified	Unknown	SupportedImported · unverified	Unknown	SupportedImported · unverified	SupportedImported · unverified	SupportedImported · unverified	SupportedImported · unverified
ICH insert characters csi-ich	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown
ED erase in display csi-ed	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown
DECSED selective erase in display csi-decsed	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown
EL erase in line csi-el	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown
DECSEL selective erase in line csi-decsel	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown
IL insert lines csi-il	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown
DL delete lines csi-dl	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown
DCH delete characters csi-dch	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown
ECH erase characters csi-ech	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown
DECSCA character protection csi-decsca	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown
DECIC insert columns csi-decic	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown
DECDC delete columns csi-decdc	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown	Unknown