Excel Chart Shortcuts

Hybrid Excel Chart Shortcuts: How To Format, Select Data and Modify Fonts

When you right click on a Chart (or in any other context), you typically get a “context menu” that looks something like the ones further down the screen. Context menus give you a sort of hidden shortcut option I call “hybrid” shortcuts. They work by simply typing the underlined hot key for a menu option — rather than clicking on it.

I call these shortcuts “hybrid” shortcuts because they’re part keyboard shortcut, part mouse shortcut. If they were animals, they might be half-man, half-beast. Kind of like the mutants below.

My favorite hybrid shortcuts involve virtually no extra motion from my hands. My left hand stays on the left side of the keyboard and my right hand stays on the mouse. Call me lazy.

I Give You Four Lazy Excel Chart Shortcuts

So here are four such lazy bum shortcuts — one for each of the man-beast mutants.

Below are some context menus you get when right-clicking on different parts of a chart. Can you spot the complication?

Here it is: sometimes the same hot key is underlined twice in the same menu. When that happens you can’t just right-click and then type the letter. No, sir.

Depending whether you want the first or section option using that hot key, you either have to hit the Spacebar to complete the selection — or tap the hot key a second time, and then hit the Spacebar. I’ve explained this in the graphic below — but maybe more clearly with my prose below it.

Let’s expand a little.

Above, no matter where you right-click on a chart, there is only one underlined E. And that E is in Select Data. So no matter where you are, you can just right-click and type E to get the Select Data dialog box. So if RC stands for right-click, then here is the shortcut:

Select Chart Data: RC-E (works in all menus above)

How about formatting part of a chart?

In the five menus on the left (above), F is the hot key for both Font and Format…

So if you right-click and then type F, nothing happens. A big dud. You stop at Font and hear crickets. You stop at Font (and not Format) because Font is the first option with F as its hot key. Here’s what it looks like if you just type RC-F and stop:

To choose the Font option, you must then hit the Spacebar. Hitting the Spacebar is the equivalent of hitting Enter, or OK, or clicking on the option with your mouse. So here’s the shortcut:

Chart Font: RC-F-Spacebar

So how do you move down to the Format option?

If you just did RC-F-F you’d be stuck on the Format line — just like you get stuck on the Font line if you just do RC-F. It would look like this:

You have to type F twice, then Spacebar, to choose Format:

Format Chart Element: RC-F-F-Spacebar (when Font appears on the menu)

If you just keep typing F, and never hit Spacebar, you’ll just go back and forth between Font and Format. If there were three options using F for the hot key, you would just keep rotating through the three options until you finally hit Spacebar to select one of them.

OK, back to an easy one.

The Format shortcut is straightforward in the two menus on the right-hand side. Why? Because Format is the only option with F as its hot key. There is no Font to screw things up. Just right-click and then type F.

Format Chart Element: RC-F (when no other menu option has F as its hot key)

Note: Since the Spacebar can be tapped with the left hand, all of the shortcuts above qualify as lazy bum shortcuts. I call them lefties because only the left hand needs to be on the keyboard.

Three “Bonus” Hybrid Shortcuts

Once you grasp how these hybrid or mutant shortcuts work, you can apply the principles to any context menu.

Because you are so nice, I’ll now share three of my favorites:

Delete: RC-D

Paste Values: RC-V

Format Cells Dialog Box: RC-F (if you’re not selecting any kind of special object like a chart or a pivot table, for example)

Conclusion

Hybrid shortcuts are a great tool for your shortcut arsenal. They can save you time in virtually any context. Just learn the basics that we just covered, and you’re good to go.

To recap, here are all of the shortcuts we just covered.

For charts: