11 Essential PyCharm Tips to Supercharge Your Python Workflow

PyCharm is one of the most popular IDEs for Python development, offering strong compatibility and rich features such as debugging, syntax highlighting, and intelligent code completion, and it also supports web frameworks like Django, greatly improving development efficiency once mastered.

For beginners, the abundance of features can be overwhelming, especially with the English interface, so this article introduces eleven of the most commonly used PyCharm tricks and shortcuts to help users quickly get up to speed.

Common Tips

1. Set Code Font

Open File → Settings , search for "font", locate the Font section, and change the Size (default 12) to a larger value such as 18 or 20.

2. Adjust Menu Text Size

To change the menu interface text size, go to File → Settings → Appearance , enable Use custom font , and select the desired size.

3. Quick Multi‑Line Comment/Uncomment

Select multiple lines of code and press Ctrl+/ to toggle comments on or off.

4. Code Reformatting

After writing code, choose Code → Reformat Code to automatically format and clean up the code style.

5. Rename Variable or Class Globally

Select the target variable or class, right‑click, choose Refactor → Rename , and the IDE will rename it across the whole project.

6. Quick Find (Ctrl+F)

Press Ctrl+F to open the search bar and locate variables, functions, or any text within the current file.

7. View Local History

Right‑click a file and select Local History to see all past versions and revert changes if needed.

8. Configure Pip to Use Domestic Mirrors

Set the package source to a domestic mirror (e.g., Tsinghua University) via File → Settings → Project → Python Interpreter → + → Manage Repositories → + and enter the mirror URL.

9. Install Packages

Open File → Settings → Project → Python Interpreter → + , type the package name (e.g., pygame), and click Install Package .

10. Debugging

Click the gutter next to a line to set a breakpoint (red dot), then right‑click the project and choose Debug to run; the debugger will pause at breakpoints, allowing step‑by‑step execution and variable inspection.

11. Set a Custom Background

Navigate to File → Settings → Appearance & Behavior → Appearance → Background Image , choose an image, adjust its display mode and opacity (around 10% is recommended) to personalize the IDE.