diff --git a/hosts/common/programs/neovim/default.nix b/hosts/common/programs/neovim/default.nix
index ba4717d1f..e49e8185e 100644
--- a/hosts/common/programs/neovim/default.nix
+++ b/hosts/common/programs/neovim/default.nix
@@ -67,12 +67,12 @@ in
         viAlias = true;
         vimAlias = true;
         plugins = plugin-packages;
-        customRC = ''
-          ${builtins.readFile ./vimrc}
+        # customRC = ''
+        #   ${builtins.readFile ./vimrc}
 
-          """"" PLUGIN CONFIG
-          ${plugin-configs}
-        '';
+        #   """"" PLUGIN CONFIG
+        #   ${plugin-configs}
+        # '';
       };
       neovim-unwrapped' = with pkgs; neovim-unwrapped.overrideAttrs (upstream: {
         # fix cross compilation:
@@ -122,9 +122,17 @@ in
       # due to <https://github.com/NixOS/nixpkgs/pull/344541>
       rubyEnv = null;
       withRuby = false;
+      wrapRc = false;  #< don't force VIMINIT env var
       postBuild = lib.replaceStrings [ "if ! $out/bin/nvim-wrapper " ] [ "if false " ] base.postBuild;
     });
 
+    fs.".config/nvim/init.vim".symlink.text = ''
+      ${builtins.readFile ./vimrc}
+
+      """"" PLUGIN CONFIG
+      ${plugin-configs}
+    '';
+
     # private because there could be sensitive things in the swap
     persist.byStore.private = [ ".cache/vim-swap" ];
     env.EDITOR = "vim";
diff --git a/hosts/common/programs/neovim/vimrc b/hosts/common/programs/neovim/vimrc
index c185d2608..515833c23 100644
--- a/hosts/common/programs/neovim/vimrc
+++ b/hosts/common/programs/neovim/vimrc
@@ -1,3 +1,6 @@
+" ENV VARS
+" VIMINIT=/path/to/init.vim to use a different vimrc
+
 " let the terminal handle mouse events, that way i get OS-level ctrl+shift+c/etc
 " this used to be default, until <https://github.com/neovim/neovim/pull/19290>
 set mouse=