Vim is a greatly improved version of the good old UNIX editor Vi. Vim allows to redirect screen messages using the `:redir` ex command to register, variables and files. It also allows to show the contents of registers using the `:registers` or `:display` ex command. When redirecting the output of `:display` to a register, Vim will free the register content before storing the new content in the register. Now when redirecting the `:display` command to a register that is being displayed, Vim will free the content while shortly afterwards trying to access it, which leads to a use-after-free. Vim pre 9.1.1115 checks in the ex_display() function, that it does not try to redirect to a register while displaying this register at the same time. However this check is not complete, and so Vim does not check the `+` and `*` registers (which typically donate the X11/clipboard registers, and when a clipboard connection is not possible will fall back to use register 0 instead. In Patch 9.1.1115 Vim will therefore skip outputting to register zero when trying to redirect to the clipboard registers `*` or `+`. Users are advised to upgrade. There are no known workarounds for this vulnerability.
Conclusion & alert: CVE-2025-26603 is rated Low Risk (21.3/100): CVSS Medium severity, with low exploitation likelihood (EPSS 0.22%). Mandatory action: Monitor for updates and reassess as exploit intelligence or EPSS changes.
Risk is dynamic; we continuously reassess and refresh what is shown on this page as upstream context changes.
EPSS lead: Daily EPSS estimates relative likelihood of exploitation; percentile ranks this CVE among scored vulnerabilities (higher = more severe relative rank).
| # | Date | Old EPSS score | New EPSS score | Delta (New - Old) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 2026-06-15 | 0.05% | 0.22% | +0.17% |
| 2 | 2025-11-21 | 0.08% | 0.05% | -0.04% |
| 3 | 2025-11-18 | — | 0.08% | — |
Full EPSS history (4 records total)
CVSS metrics for this CVE.
| Base score | Version | Severity | Vector | Exploitability | Impact | Score source |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 4.2 | 3.1 | MEDIUM |
|
0.8 | 3.4 | [email protected] |
| vendor | priority | summary | link |
|---|---|---|---|
alpine
|
— | CVE-2025-26603: 1 source package rows (vim); 215 state rows across 5 repos (3.19-main, 3.20-main, 3.21-main, 3.22-main, edge-main); fixed 2, open 213. | https://security.alpinelinux.org/vuln/CVE-2025-26603 |
debian
|
unimportant | CVE-2025-26603 unimportant priority: Debian including 1 source packages (vim), 5 status rows across 5 suites (bookworm, bullseye, forky, sid, trixie): resolved 3, open 2. | https://security-tracker.debian.org/tracker/CVE-2025-26603 |
redhat
|
low | — | https://access.redhat.com/security/cve/CVE-2025-26603 |
suse
|
medium | CVE-2025-26603 severity moderate: SUSE including 6 source package names (gvim, vim, vim-data, vim-data-common, vim-small, xxd), 168 product×package rows across 41 product lines (SLES-LTSS-TERADATA 15 SP2, SUSE Linux Enterprise High Performance Computing 15 SP3-LTSS, … (41 product lines)): Known Not Affected 168. | https://www.suse.com/security/cve/CVE-2025-26603/ |
ubuntu
|
medium | CVE-2025-26603 medium priority: Ubuntu including 1 source packages (vim), 8 status rows across 8 suites (bionic, focal, jammy, noble, oracular, trusty, upstream, xenial): released 8. | https://ubuntu.com/security/CVE-2025-26603 |
| Vendor | Product | Version | Raw CPE |
|---|---|---|---|
| vim | vim | < 9.1.1115 | cpe:2.3:a:vim:vim:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:* |
| netapp | hci_compute_node | — | cpe:2.3:h:netapp:hci_compute_node:-:*:*:*:*:*:*:* |
| URL | Tags |
|---|---|
| https://github.com/vim/vim/commit/c0f0e2380e5954f4a52a131bf6b8 | Patch |
| https://github.com/vim/vim/security/advisories/GHSA-63p5-mwg2-787v | Vendor Advisory |
| https://security.netapp.com/advisory/ntap-20250306-0003/ | Third Party Advisory |