tags: vim path
title: Vim's Runtime Path

You can tell `vim` to use an alternative `.vimrc` via
```
vim -u newvimrc
```
But this still has the ordinary runtime path.
To prepend a new runtime path, use
```
set rtp^=~/another.vim
```
To source a file from within the runtime path, use
```
runtime myfile.vim
```
and if this `myfile.vim` is in the `another.vim` you prepended to your runtime path,
it will load it. If it fails to find it here, it will search the rest of your runtime
path. You can set the `VIMRUNTIME` path as well. But if the new `VIMRUNTIME` path doesn't
contain standard `.vim` files that the systemwide `vimrc` files point to, bad things
will happen.

With [Neovim](/editor/neovim), you can use the `$NVIM_APPNAME` environment variable
to tell it which subdirectory under `~/.config` to use as its config (default is `~/.config/nvim`.