10

USEFUL
MOST
Microsoft Excel Tips
Excel: Time Saving Tips That Will
Boost Your Productivity.
 1. = Format spreadsheets faster
For circumstances when you need to format a large amount of data, Excel offers time-saving
shortcuts for many common formatting functions. Experiment with these handy ones:

Format numbers to include two decimal places: Ctrl+Shift+1

Format as time: Ctrl+Shift+2
Format as date: Ctrl+Shift+3
Format as currency: Ctrl+Shift+4
Format as percentage: Ctrl+Shift+5
Format in scientific/exponential form: Ctrl+Shift+6

Hide individual cells

Excel has a trick for ‘hiding’ cells. With the cells selected, right-click, choose Format Cells Or
CTRL+1 and then set the format as Custom under the Number tab. Enter ;;; (three semicolons)
as the format. The cell contents disappear but they’re still there and can be used in formulas.

When working on a spreadsheet, there are ways to add special formatting to different cells, columns and rows with less
effort.
 2. = Add comments to your formulas
Add a space then +N(“your comment here”) to leave comments by your formulas,
either for your own reference or to help other people understand your
spreadsheet. Comments don’t appear in the cell but do show up in the Formula
bar, and they’re searchable too.
3. = Create tables quickly & Go formula free
Create tables quickly-

You can turn data cells into a table quickly!

All you have to do is click within the parameters of your data and
press Ctrl+T. Now you have an instant table displaying your data.

Go formula free-

Getting a total without an equation might just be one of Excel's

most valuable features.
To get your total formula, click anywhere inside the Excel table.
Then press Ctrl+Shift+T, and Excel will add the total to your total
row that you created.
4. = Manipulate Table data with pivot tables
& Pivot Chart
Manipulate data with pivot tables-

When you have a large, detailed data set, pivot tables allow you to easily
manipulate your data. These tables are interactive and can help you analyze
data, detect patterns and make comparisons. Creating a pivot table is as easy
as using the built-in PivotTable and PivotChart Wizard, located in the “Data”
drop-down menu. The wizard helps you choose the data to include in your
PivotChart and format that information in a meaningful manner.

Chart your data quickly-

Select any cells in your data range/ table and then press ALT+F1 on your
keyboard. Now you have an instant chart.
 5. = Splice data easily with Slicer
Splice data easily- Slicers are available only in Excel 2010 and above.
Slicing allows you to filter data easily.
To do so, select any range in a table or PivotTable and then go to Insert > “Slicer” in the top right corner. Then,
select the column you want to filter by.

Demo of interactive chart using slicer: Linking multiple slicers to same Pivot report:
 5. = Splice data easily with Slicer
Linking one slicer to multiple pivot tables : Linking slicers to more than one chart :
 6. = Shade Alternate Rows
For a lengthy list, shading alternate rows can improve legibility and it's simple to do with Excel's Conditional Formatting feature, which
allows you to apply cell shading (green or otherwise) to every other row in a worksheet range.

Highlight the range of cells or rows or columns that you want to format.

Choose Format, Conditional Formatting to display the Conditional Formatting dialog box.

Select New Rule and then select "Use a formula to determine which cells to format," and enter =MOD(ROW(),2)=0

Shade alternate lines in Excel

into the "Format values where this formula is true". Click the Format button to bring up the Format Cells dialog box and select the Patterns
tab and specify a color for the shaded rows. Then click Ok and the rows will be formatted in the color of your choice.

You'll probably want to choose a light color, so that the default black text will still be legible. Or, you can go all out and change the text color
as well (do this in the Font tab of the Format Cells dialog box).
7. = Add a drop down list! with conditional
Adding a drop down list will not only save you a number of rows but also prevent users to fill up a wrong value. Here
is a quick explanation of how you can insert a drop down list in your excel sheet.

Step #1: select the cell where you want to appear your drop down arrow.
Step #2: Now from “Data” tab click on “Validation”.

Step #3: Here in the “Allow” field, select “List” and type the cell source from where you are taking data to list, in my
case it is from A10 to A16.
And here is your output:
8. = Apply restriction on your input using Data Validation!
Excel has a data validation function to impose such restrictions on your input. Let see how to do it:

Step #1: Select “Data” tab and choose “Validation”.

Step #2: In the validation window under Settings section select Allow as “whole number” and fill other details as per your requirement.

Step #3: Next shift to “Input message” and type your error message here.
9. = Value search with Excel’s wildcard Character!
In Excel “Question mark(?)” and “Asterik(*)” are the wild card characters that are used to complete your search.

•Question mark (?) : can take a place of single character. For example “L?gs” matches with Logs, Legs but not with “”Lungs”

•Asterik (*) : can take place of any number of characters. In the above example if we replace “?” with “*” like “L*gs” then it
gives results that matches with Logs, Legs and lungs as well.
 10. = Create your own shortcuts
Generally, there are only three options available on the top toolbar “Save, Undo and Redo”. You can
also create your own shortcuts like print, copy, paste and many more. To set your own shortcut click
on the drop down arrow in your toolbar and check whatever options you want to add. Here I am
adding only copy and paste shortcuts in my toolbar.
 Top 10 Excel Shortcuts You Need to Know
1. Insert Total Sum
Select the cells you want to add up, then select the cell in which you want the total value to be displayed, and then press Alt + =.
2. Insert Current Time
Press Ctrl + Shift + Colon to enter the current time into a cell. .
3. Insert Current Date
Just like with inserting the current time, inserting the current date is as simple as hitting a hotkey combination on a cell. Press Ctrl + Colon and you'll have the
current date.
4. Select the Entire Column
Select any cell in the desired column and press Ctrl + Space to select that entire column.
5. Select the Entire Row
Select any cell in the desired row and press Shift + Space to select that entire row.
6. Hide a Column
There are times when you want to compare data between two different columns, but there's another column in the middle that makes it a little difficult to
visually compare the two.
You can temporarily hide that middle column by selecting a cell in it and pressing Ctrl + 0.
7. Hide a Row
You can also hide rows by selecting a cell and press Ctrl + 9.
8. Start a New Line in a Cell
You can enter a new line in a cell by hitting Alt + Enter.
Without this Excel shortcut, the only way to add a line within a cell is to separately type your text out (with line breaks) in a separate program like Notepad or
Word, and then copy and paste it on the cell -- that's way too tedious.
9. Add Bullet Points Within a Cell
You can also add bullet points within a cell by hitting Alt + 7.
10. Show/Hide Formulas
Want to check what formulas you are using throughout the spreadsheet? Hit Ctrl + ~ to reveal all of the formulas in the spreadsheet at once.
You can then hide them by hitting the same hotkey combination again.
 Tips for Excel
– Institute for Automation, Research and Education
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