Excel Tip: Keyboard Shortcuts

When I sit down to work on an Excel document, I am efficient. As it turns out, I pride myself on my efficiency. For example, I was at Starbucks this week, and I ordered a refill. (A refill is your second cup of coffee at Starbucks, and only costs 50 cents). When I handed the Barista exact change and my empty Starbucks paper cup with the lid removed, she knew exactly what I wanted and I did not have to speak at all. She said to me: Wow, you are efficient. I beamed: Thank you for the most amazing compliment! My Excel efficiency comes from knowing a handful of keyboard shortcuts. Read the full article for my favorite.

Navigating a worksheet

There are a handful of keyboard shortcuts that will help you move around a worksheet. We start with the fundamental concept of moving the active cell, and then add certain keys to expand the functionality.

Arrow Keys
To move one cell to the right, press the right arrow. This is obvious, I admit. However, you will see how we build on this. Likewise, pressing the up arrow, down arrow, and left arrow moves one cell up, down and left respectively.

Adding the Control Key
Now for the fun. To move to the edge of the data region, hold the CTRL key down while selecting one of the arrow keys. Data region refers to contiguous cells of data. So, if you are in a contiguous range of data, pressing the CTRL + arrow key, will move you to the last cell with data. If you are in an area of the worksheet that has no data, pressing the CTRL + arrow key will move you to the beginning of the data range. Let's take a look at an example.

In Figure 109 below, the active cell is A1. You would like to change the formula in cell D5.

Figure 109

So, use CTRL + Right arrow key to jump to C1, or the beginning of the data region. Use CTRL + Right Arrow to jump to D1, or the end of the data region. Use CTRL + Down arrow to jump to D5, or the end of the data region, as shown in Figure 110.

Figure 110

Using this type of navigation will dramatically improve your speed.

Adding the Shift Key

By adding the Shift Key, you add selection capability. While holding down the shift key, move one cell to the right by using the right arrow key, and you will select the cells. Similarly, by holding down the both shift key and the control key while pressing an arrow key, you select the cells to the edge of the data region. Let’s follow this through an example. Starting with Figure 109 above, let’s say you want to select the entire sales table. Simply, press CTRL + Right arrow key to move the active cell to C1, the beginning of the data region as shown in Figure 111.

Figure 111

Now, hold down the shift key, and press CTRL + right arrow to select all cells to the end of the data region, or D1, as shown in Figure 112.

Figure 112

Now, hold down the shift key, and press CTRL + down arrow to select all of the cells to the end of the data region, or D5, as shown in Figure 113.

Figure 113

As you can see, using the keys in combination can provide extremely efficient worksheet navigation.

Shortcut summary

Arrow keys = Move one cell
CTRL + Arrow keys = Move to edge of data region
Shift + Arrow keys = Select cells
Shift + CTRL + Arrow keys = Select cells to edge of data region

Navigating a workbook

You will find that you frequently want to move to the next sheet in a multi-sheet workbook. Using the mouse, you simply click on the tab strip at the bottom of the workbook. Using the keyboard, simply press CTRL + Page Down to move one sheet to the right. Likewise, CTRL + Page Up moves one sheet to the left.

Shortcut Summary

CTRL + Page Down = Move one sheet to the right
CRTL + Page Up = Move one sheet to the left

There are obviously many more keyboard shortcuts you can learn, however, try to use the ones above first because they provide the most benefit and are relatively easy to learn.

Working with Text

Edit text in a cell

Once you successfully navigate to a cell, you will probably want to edit the text within the cell. By pressing the F2 key, you can edit the contents of the active cell. The insertion point will be at the end of the text. This is a quick way to begin the process of editing the cell.

Shortcut summary

F2 = Enter edit mode in a cell

Move within the text in a cell

Now that you have successfully entered the cell to edit by pressing F2, it is time to move to the spot in the text that you want to edit. These concepts are similar to navigating within a worksheet.

Once the insertion point is in the cell, using the arrow keys moves one character at a time. By holding down the Control key while pressing the arrow keys moves one word at a time. By holding down the shift key while pressing the arrow keys selects text one character at a time. By holding down the shift key and the control key while pressing the arrow keys selects text one word at a time.

Lastly, using the home and end key while in text edit mode moves you to the beginning and end of the text.

Shortcut Summary

Arrow keys = Move one character at a time
CTRL + arrow keys = Move one word at a time
Shift + arrow keys = Select one character at a time
Shift + CTRL + arrow keys = Select one word at a time