Tom’s Tutorials For Excel: Using the Keyboard to Select a Row, Column, or All Cells

Tom’s Tutorials For Excel: Using the Keyboard to Select a Row, Column, or All Cells

Here are a few keyboard shortcuts for selecting your worksheet cells.

To select the entire row of your active cell, press the Shift+Spacebar keys.



To select the entire column of your active cell, press the Ctrl+Spacebar keys.



To select all cells on your worksheet, press Ctrl+A+A (pictured), or Ctrl+Shift+Spacebar.

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5 comments on “Tom’s Tutorials For Excel: Using the Keyboard to Select a Row, Column, or All Cells
  1. Colin says:

    Be aware that if the active cell is within a structured table, these shortcuts only select the cells in the row/column WITHIN THE TABLE (i.e. the selection stops at the boundary of the table)!
    For example, pressing Ctrl+Spacebar does NOT select the entire column in the sheet but only the range of cells in that column that are within the table.

    • Tom Urtis says:

      Thanks for following my Excel blog.

      Well, you are right, and it’s a good point for people who use Tables in the formal sense. I didn’t go into that level of scenario detail with this tutorial, due to my own bias of not using the Table feature. For example, in a PivotTable report or in the source data not formally designated as a Table for a PivotTable report, Shift+Spacebar does select the entire row. The Table feature is something I don’t use, I know it has its place for some users but I never use it, instead I just redefine the dynamic ranges of source lists in my code.

      Thanks for pointing out how those keystrokes behave differently inside a Table. Good tip for clarification.

  2. sufi says:

    really hepfullllllll

  3. ashutosh says:

    Hello,
    I find these tips very helpful. Is there any method to select a particular range in a row using keyboard shortcuts ?

    • Tom Urtis says:

      Yes there are, depending on the nature of the range. Ctrl+Shift+Right arrow selects the contiguously populated cells from the active cell to the rightmost populated cell. Same in reverse for Ctrl+Shift+Left arrow. Shift+Home selects from active cell to column A of that row. Shift+Spacebar selects the entire active column and Ctrl+Spacebar selects the active row. Ctrl+* selects the current region. There are others, these are just a few examples.

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