Most Useful Excel Shortcuts - Managing Workbooks, Formatting, Formulas, Navigation, and Data Entry

Oct 13, 2026

Upload by Eliana

A shortcut reference for Excel productivity across key workflows: managing workbooks (create, open, save, close, print), formatting data (format cells, convert selections to tables), working with formulas (autocomplete, reference-type cycling, toggling values vs formulas, inserting formulas from the above cell), navigating and viewing data (ribbon toggling, switching workbooks and worksheets, go-to, find, and quick cell jumps), entering data (edit, multiline entry, date/time insertion, fill across selections, paste special, redo), and selecting ranges, rows, and columns.

LanguageEnglish

CategoryPresentations

FormatPDF

Pages2

Reading Time1 min

AccessFree to download

Managing workbooks

Formatting data

Working with formulas

Navigating and viewing data

Entering data

Selecting data

Managing workbooks | Press | In order to: | | --- | --- | | Ctrl+N | Create a new workbook. | | Ctrl+O | Open an existing workbook. | | Ctrl+S | Save the active workbook. | | F12 | Save the active workbook under a new name, displays the Save as dialog box. | | CTRL+W | Close the active workbook. | | Ctrl+C | Copy the contents of the selected cells to Clipboard. | | Ctrl+X | Cut the contents of the selected cells to Clipboard. | | Ctrl+V | Insert the contents of the Clipboard into the selected cell(s) . | | Ctrl+Z | Undo your last action. Panic button :) | | Ctrl+P | Open the "Print" dialog. | Formatting data | Press | In order to: | | --- | --- | | Ctrl+1 | Open the "Format Cells" dialog. | | Ctrl+T | Convert selected cells to a table. You can also select any cell in a range of related data, and pressing CTRL+T will make it a table. Find more about Excel tables and their features: [www.ablebits.com/office-addins-blog/2011/09/23/excel-tables-ranges/](www.ablebits.com/office-addins-blog/2011/09/23/excel-tables-ranges/) | Working with formulas | Press | In order to: | | --- | --- | | Tab | Autocomplete the function name.
Example: Enter = and start typing vl, press Tab and you will get =vlookup( | | F4 | Cycle through various combinations of formula reference types. Place the cursor within a cell and hit F4 to get the needed reference type: absolute, relative or mixed (relative column and absolute row, absolute column and relative row) . | | CTRL+` | Toggle between displaying cell values and formulas. | | CTRL+' | Insert the formula of the above cell into the currently selected cell or the Formula Bar. | Navigating and viewing data | Press | In order to: | | --- | --- | | CTRL+F1 | Show / hide the Excel Ribbon.
Hide the ribbon to view more than 4 rows of data. | | Ctrl + Tab | Switch to the next open Excel workbook. | | Ctrl+PgDown | Switch to the next worksheet.
Press Ctrl+PgUp to switch to the previous sheet. | | Ctrl+G | Open the "Go to" dialog. Pressing F5 displays the same dialog. | | CTRL+F | Display the "Find" dialog box. | | Home | Return to the 1st cell of the current row in a worksheet. | | Ctrl+Home | Move to the beginning of a worksheet (А1 cell) . | | Ctrl+End | Move to the last used cell of the current worksheet, i.e. the lowest row of the rightmost column. | Entering data | Press | In order to: | | --- | --- | | F2 | Edit the current cell. | | Alt+Enter | In cell editing mode, enter a new line (carriage return) into a cell. | | CTRL+; | Enter the current date. Press CTRL+Shift+; to enter the current time. | | CTRL+ENTER | Fill the selected cells with the contents of the current cell.
Example: select several cells. Press and hold down Ctrl, click on any cell within selection and press F2 to edit it. Then hit Ctrl+Enter and the contents of the edited cell will be copied into all selected cells. | | CTRL+D | Copy the contents and format of the first cell in the selected range into the cells below. If more than one column is selected, the contents of the topmost cell in each column will be copied downwards. | | Ctrl+Shift+V | Open the "Paste Special" dialog when clipboard is not empty. | | CTRL+Y | Repeat (Redo) the last action, if possible. | Selecting data | Press | In order to: | | --- | --- | | Ctrl+A | Select the entire worksheet. If the cursor is currently placed within a table, press once to select the table, press one more time to select the whole worksheet. | | Ctrl+Home
then Ctrl+Shift+End | Select the entire range of your actual used data on the current worksheet. | | Ctrl+Space | Select the entire column. | | Shift+Space | Select the entire row. |

FAQs

Which shortcuts create and save Excel workbooks quickly?

Use Ctrl+N to create a new workbook, Ctrl+O to open an existing one, Ctrl+S to save the active workbook, and F12 to Save As via the dialog.

How can you toggle between showing cell values and formulas?

Press CTRL+` to switch between displaying cell values and displaying formulas.

What shortcuts help move around the worksheet and select data ranges?

Use Ctrl+Home to jump to A1, Ctrl+End to jump to the last used cell, and use Ctrl+A (table-aware) plus Ctrl+Space and Shift+Space to select entire columns and rows.

Oct 13, 2026

Upload by Eliana