Overview
Keyboard shortcuts are crucial for working efficiently, especially in apps like Excel where we tend to spend a ton of time. Most people learn a few of them as the only way to perform some actions, but don’t give much thought into how much time they can save. Even fewer people realize you can customize the shortcuts you use and even make your own!
I learned dozens of shortcuts early in my career out of sheer necessity. I was working on a large project out of town with 200+ colleagues, and we had an insanely small space to work in. I had about as much space as the middle seat on an airplane! I had no space to move my mouse and touchpads were terrible back then! I learned several shortcuts, and built many of my own by recording macros. I quickly gained a reputation for problem solving and working efficiently.
In this article, we’ll cover why keyboard shortcuts are so helpful, then I’ll walk through my 10 favorite high-impact, underused keyboard shortcuts, including a video below, where you can see them in action.
Why keyboard shortcuts are better than the mouse
Keyboard shortcuts are 3x or more faster than using the mouse. Don’t believe me? Try an exercise like the one in this video. Keyboard shortcuts are quicker because:
- It takes time just to move your hand to the mouse/touchpad, then move the cursor, then click something.
- Using the mouse is a fine motor skill (ever clicked the wrong tiny arrow button?!?), while the keyboard is more of a gross motor skill.
- Mouse actions are often menu-driven, requiring multiple menu/button clicks.
- It adds clarity to your data, making it easier to communicate to key stakeholders.
- Keyboard shortcuts often combine multiple steps into one.
They may just save a few seconds at a time, but over the course of a year, that can add up to WEEKS! Are keyboard shortcuts the only way to get things done? Of course not. The mouse is still an integral tool (try living without one for a week!). It’s great for scrolling, precise clicking/selections, and for some actions, it may actually be quicker because of the muscle memory you’ve built. But for most actions, you’ll be amazed at how much quicker keyboard shortcuts can be.
How you can learn keyboard shortcuts
In addition to this article, we’ve got two great resources you can use to learn keyboard shortcuts across several apps (Excel, Outlook, PowerPoint, Word, Google Chrome, and File Explorer):
- A searchable list of keyboard shortcuts
- Downloadable PDF and Excel lists of keyboard shortcuts
Use these to determine which keyboard shortcuts you should learn and practice. Focus on just a couple at a time. Pay attention to the actions you perform, especially the ones that take multiple clicks or that you find yourself repeatedly searching for. Those will free up time to learn others!
If you’re still struggling with what to learn, consider these areas in Excel:
- Navigation – Moving about and selecting files, sheets, and ranges
- Structure – Inserting, deleting, moving, and writing formulas
- Formatting – Colors, numbers, fonts, sizes, borders, etc.
- Analysis – Filtering, sorting, finding, etc.
Don’t limit yourself to just learning keyboard shortcuts in Excel. Whichever apps you use most, find and learn the shortcuts for your most common commands. Many of them work the same way across apps.
In addition to the shortcuts covered below, there are two keys worth learning that are gateways to hundreds of shortcuts: The Alt key and the Menu key. The Alt key activates the ribbon and other menus where you can press further keys in a sequence to run virtually any command. The sequences can be a little tough to memorize (that’s why I built so many of my own!). The Menu key (usually to the right of the spacebar on Windows keyboards) usually mimics the right-click action. The right-click menu is great because it’s context-based, and shows options based on what you’re doing. You can also type letters to choose options off of the right-click menu (i.e. I for insert or F for format), much like the Alt key approach.
Building your own shortcuts
Chances are for most of the actions you routinely perform, there’s already a keyboard shortcut available. If not, you can your own shortcuts – within a specific application or at the operating system level. Lastly, within the XLEV8 Excel Add-in, you can specify which keyboard shortcuts you want to use for hundreds of custom tools. Be careful setting your own keyboard shortcuts – make sure not to overwrite the ones you already use (i.e. Ctrl+c to copy)!
Building application-level keyboard shortcuts
The first keyboard shortcut I ever made (in the opening story) was to highlight the selected cells yellow in Excel. I found myself doing that over and over again, so I recorded my actions and assigned it to Ctrl+y as the shortcut. I made many similar small macros/shortcuts after that, and you can do the same. Many apps allow you to record your actions and assign keyboard shortcuts to them, or assign keyboard shortcuts to existing commands. If you do this, make sure to save the macro in a place where it’s available for all files (not just the active file), so you can reuse it, if you so desire. I highly recommend keeping a list of these in case you ever need to troubleshoot, or just so you know what keyboard shortcuts are left that you can assign!
Building operating system-level keyboard shortcuts
There’s some serious power here. Virtually anything can be scripted if you’re up for it. For Windows, I’ve dabbled a little with AutoHotKey (https://www.autohotkey.com/) and I’ve had great results. It’s much more than keyboard shortcuts but that’s often what people do – script or combine many actions and assign them to a keyboard shortcut. It also works with the mouse keys! It’s open source, free to use, and extremely well-documented internally and throughout the internet at large. For Mac users, Keyboard Maestro (http://www.keyboardmaestro.com/main/) and similar solutions are available but full disclosure – I haven’t used these.
Defining XLEV8 Excel Add-in keyboard shortcuts
After a few years into my career, I ran out of available keys for shortcuts. I was also frustrated that every time I switched to a new computer, I had to reassign all the keyboard shortcuts. Those are two of the reasons I built the XLEV8 Excel Add-in – many shortcuts are pre-set and you can assign them in bulk (sharing with colleagues or reusing later!). There are hundreds of macros in the add-in – shortcuts that combine commands and high-volume automation tools. It’s designed to save you 200+ hours a year in Excel by navigating, formatting, building, analyzing, and updating faster and reducing errors. Learn more on the Apps page, or check out a quick demo.
The 10 keyboard shortcuts you need to know
- Ctrl+Shift+Space – This is a 6-in-1 shortcut! Use it to select all cells in a region, then again to select all data in the sheet. If a shape/picture is selected, use it to select all shapes on the sheet. If a table is selected, use once to select all data in the table, again to also include the table headers, then again to select all cells in the entire sheet.
- Alt+; – This will select only the visible cells in your selected range. If you have hidden columns/rows, or you have filtered rows out, this is helpful for selecting only what is visible to ensure formatting or other updates only apply to those visible rows.
- Cltr+` – This will toggle displaying cell values and their underlying formulas. It can be very helpful for troubleshooting formulas.
- Alt+PageDown / Alt+PageUp – These will scroll one page right and left (horizontally), which is helpful when you have several columns of data in your worksheet.
- F4 – This will repeat your last action when you are not editing a formula. When editing a formula, it will toggle the reference type between relative and absolute references.
- Ctrl+Shift+W
– This displays the Macro Search box, which uses auto-complete to show macros to run as you type. It displays the description and other details, including the support page link. When a macro is selected, you can set it as a favorite, set a keyboard shortcut, or set a ribbon UI shortcut for it. It’s a shortcut to hundreds of commands, including custom macros you’ve saved or macros in your active workbook. - Ctrl+Shift+O – This displays the Search Recent Files box, which uses auto-complete to show your recent files as you type. This helps you find and open virtually any file in just seconds! You can mark your favorite files to restrict the search results.
- Ctrl+Shift+S – This displays the Sheet Action Picker list. It offers several sheet-related shortcuts, including adding, deleting, renaming, hiding/unhiding, moving, adding a linked table of contents, jumping to the first/last sheet, and searching for sheets with auto-complete. It saves a significant amount of time in navigating and updating sheets. There are dozens of similar picklist-style macros for other common Excel actions available.
- Ctrl+Shift+Y – This toggles through your five customizable favorite fill colors (and back to no fill color). It’s six shortcuts in one!
- Ctrl+Shift+B – This will select to the bottom of your selected columns, including over any blanks. It can cycle through three ranges – the bottom of the active column, the bottom of the left-adjacent column, and the bottom-most row used in the entire sheet. A similar macro works the same way but across the row to the right.
Video
Summary
If you want a surefire way to work more efficiently, keyboard shortcuts are crucial. They free up time for more important tasks, but it’s easy to miss the massive impact because it’s often just a few seconds saved, multiplied over hundreds of times a day. It’s also about keeping your brain fresh. Every single micro thought (like where to move the mouse) takes away valuable brainpower, and there’s only so much in the tank each day before we start to make things worse for ourselves. Commit to learning a couple of keyboard shortcuts a week, and you’ll get so much more done!
What keyboard shortcuts can you not live without? Have you built any custom shortcuts in Excel or beyond? Let us know in the comments below!
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