20 Google Sheets Shortcuts You Must Know! ⌨️

There are so many things that a lot of us do regularly in Google Sheets. And while a lot of these options are readily available with a few clicks, you can be a lot more productive if you get used to a few Google Sheets keyboard shortcuts.

You’ll be amazed at how much faster you can work when you know only a couple of shortcuts (mostly for the tasks that you do a lot – such as formatting cells or deleting rows).

In this article, I am sharing my top 20 Google Sheets keyboard shortcuts that I find myself using quite often (and I am sure these will also save you time).

In case you want a quick list, click here to get to the table at the end of this article that shows all Google Sheets keyboard shortcuts in one place.

So let’s get started!

Enabling Compatible Shortcuts in Google Sheets

Before I take you to the shortcuts, there is something you need to do to make sure you have access to all these shortcuts.

Since Google Sheets is a web-based tool, a lot of the keyboard shortcuts that are available in other spreadsheet tools such as MS Excel are not available and you need to enable these.

Below are the steps to enable compatible shortcuts in Google Sheets:

1. Click the Help option in the menu
2. Click on Keyboard shortcuts
3. In the Keyboard Shortcuts dialog box that opens, enable the ‘Enable compatible spreadsheet shortcuts‘ option

Once you do this, you will get access to a lot of shortcuts that are also the same in Excel.

Top 20 Google Sheets Shortcuts

Here is a list of my top 20 Google Sheets keyboard shortcuts.

In case you want to get the whole list, I have a bigger list at the end of this article (click here to jump to the bigger list).

1. Repeat the Last Action

If you can only pick up one Google Sheets shortcut from this article, it should be this one.

Below is the Google Sheets keyboard shortcut to repeat the last action:

With this shortcut, you will be able to repeat the last action you performed again with a single button.

For example, if you color a cell red, you can go to any other cell and simply press F4 and it will color this cell red as well.

Just remember that it will only repeat the last action. So if you make the cell color red make the font style bold, using F4 will only apply bold font format as that was the last action it remembers.

2. Cut/Copy/Paste/Undo/Redo

These are the staple shortcuts that are standard and work across applications (Google applications as well as outside Google such as Excel and PowerPoint).

Below are the shortcuts to Cut/Copy/Paste/Undo/Redo:

3. Insert Row or Insert Column

Inserting a new row or column is again something we need to do quite often.

Below is the keyboard shortcut to quickly insert a row (or insert a column) in Google Sheets:

In case you’re not using Chrome on PC, you need to hold the Shift key with the ALT key when using these shortcuts.

Related tutorial: How to Insert Multiple Rows in Google Sheets

4. Delete Row or Delete Column

Just like way we inserted rows and columns, you can also easily delete rows and columns using a keyboard shortcut.

Below is the keyboard shortcut to quickly delete a row in Google Sheets:

In case you’re not using Chrome on PC, you need to hold the Shift key with the ALT key when using these shortcuts.

Related tutorials: How to Delete Empty Rows in Google Sheets

5. Select the Whole Row (or Select Whole Column)

This could be useful when you want to apply or remove the formatting from the entire row or column at one go.

Below are the shortcuts to select the whole row or column in one go in Google Sheets:

6. Paste Value Only (or Paste format only)

When you copy and paste cells in Google Sheets, it will copy the value in the cell as well as the formula and the formatting of the cell (including the conditional formatting).

With this shortcut, you can copy the cell and only paste the value in some other cell. This is also useful when you want to convert formula to values.

You can copy the cells that have the formulas and simply paste them as value over them. This will make the formulas go away and you will be left with only the values and the formatting that was originally there.

Similarly, you can also just copy the format of cells and nothing else.

Below are the shortcuts to paste only values or paste only formats (use these after you have copied the cells and selected the ones where you need to paste these):

7. Find Values (Or Find and Replace Values) in Google Sheets

You can easily find (or find and then replace) content of cells based on their values.

And to do this, you first need to open the find and replace dialog box.

Below are the keyboard shortcuts to open the Find (or Find and Replace) dialog box in Google Sheets:

Note that when you open the Find dialog box, it just opens a simple search box at the top right of the sheet. And when you enter any text in it, Google Sheets would highlight all the cells that have the matching value (in real-time) and also show you the number of cells where it found the value.

When you use the Find and Replace option, it opens a dialog box that has a lot many options to find and replace text in Google Sheets.

Related Tutorial: How To Remove Duplicates In Google Sheets

8. Add New Sheet in Google Sheets with a Shortcut

While it’s already quite easy to add a new sheet to your Google Sheets document, this shortcut makes it really easy and fast.

Below is the keyboard shortcut to add a new sheet in the current Google Sheets document:

Unfortunately, this shortcut is not available for Mac (at least at the time of writing this tutorial)

9. Formatting Shortcuts (Bold, Underline, Italics, Strikethrough)

There are a bunch of formatting shortcuts that can save you time and make it a good experience working with Google Sheets.

And thankfully, these are the standard keyboard shortcuts that you may already know if you have been using computers for a while.

Below are the commonly used formatting keyboard shortcuts:

While the first three are quite standard, the shortcut to apply strikethrough in Google Sheets is specific to Google Sheets (in Excel you need to use Control + 5 to apply strikethrough formatting).

Also, note that these are toggle shortcuts. This means that if you use it once, it will apply the formatting and if you use it again, it will remove the formatting.

10. Cell Alignment (Center, Left, Right) Shortcuts in Google Sheets

Alignment options are again something used quite often, and Google Sheets has made it quite easy to change the alignment by adding these options in the toolbar.

But in case you prefer shortcuts to change the alignment (center, right, left), here are the shortcuts:

11. Insert a Link in a Cell Using a Shortcut

You can link your cells with external URLs as well as to any sheet or cell/range in the current Google Sheets document.

And to do this, you need to open the ‘Insert link’ dialog box. Once you have it open, there are many options to create the link.

Below is the keyboard shortcut to insert a link by opening the Insert Link dialog box:

Related tutorial: How to Create Table of Contents in Google Sheets | Remove Hyperlinks in Google Sheets

12. Insert Date and Time Shortcuts In Google Sheets

If you want to quickly get the current date or the current time value in a cell, you can do that easily with a keyboard shortcut.

Below is the shortcut to insert the current date or current time in Google sheets:

Note that when you use this formula, it will insert a static value in the cell which will not change as time passes.

If you want to get a value that updates to reflect the current date or time, you can use the TODAY and NOW functions.

Related Tutorial: Automatically Insert Timestamps in Google Sheets

13. Clear all formatting from a cell or range of cells

If you want to quickly remove all the formatting from a cell or a range of cells, you can use this keyboard shortcut.

It will remove everything (such as the color, border, font size, font color) except the value in the cell. Once you use it, you will have the cell in the default state with the cell content in it.

Below is the keyboard shortcut to remove all formatting from a cell in Google Sheets:

Related tutorial: Apply Conditional Formatting based on Another Cell Value in Google Sheets

14. Move to the Next Sheet (or Previous Sheets) with a Keyboard Shortcut

As you get multiple sheets in a Google Sheets document, it can be a pain going back and forth these sheets.

Thankfully there is a keyboard shortcut that allows you to quickly go to the next worksheet (or go to the previous worksheet)

Using these shortcuts would only take you to the next sheet (or previous sheet if you use the second one). If you need to go to the sheets which are next to next, you will have to use the keyboard shortcut twice.

15. Display All Sheets in the Google Sheets Workbook

Another useful feature when working with a lot of sheets is to quickly see a list of all the sheets in one place and then select the one to which you want to go.

When you have a lot of sheets, this is a better method than moving through sheets using the shortcuts covered in the above section.

The above shortcut will only show you a list of all the sheets in the workbook. You will have to go to the one-sheet name that you want to go to and then click on it.

Also, you will see hidden sheets in the list, and if you click on it, you will be taken to that sheet and it will be unhidden.

16. Open links with a shortcut

When you have a lot of links in cells and you want to open all these at one go, you can use this keyboard shortcut.

I find it useful when I have multiple URLs in cells that I want to open all at one go instead of opening it one by one.

17. Insert Note/Comment with Keyboard Shortcut

In Google Sheets, you can insert a note in a cell or a comment (which is a threaded conversation) using the below keyboard shortcuts.

18. Show All formulas in the worksheet

When you enter a formula in a cell in Google Sheets, it would always show you the result of the formula.

But if you want to quickly see all the formulas (and not their values), you can use the below keyboard shortcut.

This is a toggle keyboard shortcut, which means that if you use it again, it will revert the cells with formulas back to the original state where they will show values and not formulas.

19. Change references to Absolute/Relative/Mixed

When working with formulas in Google Sheets, you may want to change the reference to absolute or relative.

While you can do this by manually adding the dollar sign before the column alphabet or row number, it’s better to use the below keyboard shortcut:

20. Fill Down (or Fill Right) the Value or formula

When doing data entry work in Google Sheets, you will often find yourself copying and pasting the same cell value that you have in the cell above (or in the cell to the right).

Instead of doing it the long way by first copying the cell and then pasting it, you can use the below shortcuts:

When you use this shortcut, it will copy the value in the cell as well as the formatting/formula in it.

So there are my top 20 Keyboard shortcuts in Google Sheets that I use on a daily basis.

There are, however, a lot more of these and I am providing a bigger list of these shortcuts below.

100+ Google Sheets Keyboard Shortcuts

Hope you found this tutorial useful.

Other useful Google Sheets tutorials:

• How To Insert Multiple Rows in Google Sheets
• How To Freeze Rows in Google Sheets
• How To Zoom-In and Zoom-Out in Google Sheets
• Microsoft Excel Vs Google Sheets
• How To Move Columns in Google Sheets
• Ultimate Guide to the Best Excel Keyboard Shortcuts