Microsoft Excel is incomplete without shortcut keys. You just cannot enjoy working on Excel documents without the use of keyboard shortcuts.
While working on an excel document, you cannot rule out the importance of keyboard shortcuts. Without them, your working would be as insipid as a nice curry without salt. You may get irritated switching your fingers from keyboard to mouse and vice-versa. You should master these shortcut keys by heart, if you have too much to do on Microsoft excel. You should also be aware that some keys have different functions on word and excel, and that’s why you ought to learn them separately. To learn about the shortcut keys in word, please see this post, “Keyboard shortcuts in Microsoft word”. As far as Microsoft excel is concerned, here is a basic list prepared for you.
Microsoft Excel shortcut keys with description
Shortcut Keys
|
Description
|
Ctrl+O
|
Open an existing Excel document
|
Ctrl+N
|
Create a new Excel document
|
Ctrl+S
|
Opens the save as box
|
Ctrl+P
|
Opens the print window
|
Ctrl+A
|
Selects the whole worksheet
|
Ctrl+Shift+Backspace
|
Selects the whole worksheet
|
Shift+Backspace
|
Selects the entire row of the Excel sheet
|
Ctrl+Backspace
|
Selects the entire column of the Excel sheet
|
Shift+Arrow key
|
Makes a progressive selection of the cells in the direction of the arrow
|
Shift+Home
|
Selects from the current cell to the start of the row
|
Shift+Pg up
|
Selects from the current cell to a page upwards in a column
|
Shift+Pg dn
|
Selects from the current cell to a page downwards in a column
|
Ctrl+Shift+Home
|
Makes a rectangular selection from the current cell to the start of the work sheet
|
Ctrl+Shift+End
|
Makes a rectangular selection from the current cell to the end of the work on the worksheet
|
Ctrl+Home
|
Moves to the starting cell of the work sheet
|
Ctrl+End
|
Moves to the last non-empty cell on the worksheet
|
Home
|
Moves to the starting cell of the row
|
Ctrl+Left arrow
|
Moves to the starting cell of the row
|
Ctrl+Right arrow
|
Moves to the Last cell of the row
|
Ctrl+Up arrow
|
Moves to the first cell of the column
|
Ctrl+Down arrow
|
Moves to the last cell of the column
|
Ctrl+Pg up
|
Opens in the next sheet rightways
|
Ctrl+Pg dn
|
Opens in the next sheet leftways
|
Shift+F11
|
Inserts a new worksheet in the document
|
F7
|
Go to a specific cell
|
F2
|
Edit the cell, same as double clicking on the cell
|
F11
|
Create a chart
|
Ctrl+T
|
Insert a table, Can also be done with Ctrl+L
|
Ctrl+K
|
Hyperlink to a specific sheet of the document or any other document
|
Ctrl+G
|
Opens go to window
|
Ctrl+;
|
Insert the current date
|
Ctrl+Shift+;
|
Insert the current time
|
Shift+F3
|
Opens the excel formula window
|
Shift+F5
|
Search box
|
Ctrl+5
|
Strike through the selected text
|
Ctrl+F9
|
Minimizes the current window
|
Ctrl+F10
|
Maximizes the selected window
|
Alt+=
|
Creates a basic summation formula to sum up the cells above
|
Ctrl+9
|
Deletes the whole row
|
Ctrl+10
|
Deletes the whole column
|
Ctrl+1
|
Opens the format window
|
Ctrl+Shift+7
|
Creates a border for the selection
|
Ctrl+Shift+8
|
Makes a justified selection of all the corresponding non-empty cells
|
Ctrl+Shift+!
|
Displays the number in a decimal form
|
Ctrl+Shift+@
|
Displays the number in time format
|
Ctrl+Shift+#
|
Converts the number into date format
|
Ctrl+Shift+$
|
Displays the number in currency format
|
Ctrl+Shift+%
|
Displays the number in percentages
|
Ctrl+Shift+^
|
Displays the number in scientific formatting
|
The given Keyboard shortcuts form the basis of most operations in a Microsoft Excel worksheet. Some keyboard shortcuts such as ctrl+c, ctrl+v, ctrl+x, ctrl+z, ctrl+y, ctrl+b, ctrl+u, ctrl+i and so on, are common to most office documents and thus are not listed here. You can find those keyboard shortcuts in the post dealing with Microsoft word shortcut keys.
