How to assign a hotkey to Thunar custom actions and menu items

Thunar is a lightweight file manager app in the Linux desktop environment called XFCE. Having a minimalist look, it offers a wide range of powerful features for the user. In this article, we will see how to customize hotkeys for menu commands and custom actions in Thunar.

Thunar allows the user to re-assign any hotkey to its main menu items. You just need to activate the appropriate option. Here is how it can be done.

1. Open the Settings center of XFCE and click on the Appearance icon. You can also open it directly by typing the following command in your terminal or in the Application Finder:

   xfce4-appearance-settings

   

2. Go to the Settings tab and activate the option "Enable editable accelerators" as shown below:

Now you can assign custom hotkeys.

Assign hotkeys to default menu items

To assign a new hotkey to a default menu item, hover your mouse pointer over it but don't click it:

Now, don't touch your mouse and leave the mouse pointer over the item. Press the desired hotkey you want to assign to the current menu item. Once you press it, it will be assigned. See the following screenshot:

Using this method, you can assign hotkeys to any main menu item. Only some dynamic submenus like File - New - "template list" do not support this feature, but it is a very minor limitation.

Assign hotkeys to custom actions

Custom items are useful commands, usually called from the context menu.

Unfortunately, the trick described above is not applicable to the context menu. However, custom actions are displayed in the main menu too, under the File menu.

From there, you can hover your pointer over the desired custom action and assign your hotkey. It works as expected:

The ability to customize hotkeys in Thunar improves the usability of this excellent file manager and saves your time. Now, you can set hotkeys for all commands you use frequently and speed up your workflow.