All Excel users should be able to activate cells and enter data in an Excel spreadsheet; after all, these are the most basic Excel actions. However, many Excel beginners don’t fully understand the difference between an ‘on’ cell and a cell in ‘edit mode’. Even the most advanced Excel users are often unaware of all the different ways you can select a range of cells or enter edit mode for cells in Excel.
When you click on a cell in an Excel spreadsheet, the cell is not in edit mode, it is just activated. If you start typing while a cell is active, the typed text replace the content of the activated cell. Or, if you press the left, right, up, or down arrow keys on your keyboard, this will move the activation to an adjacent cell (to the left, right, above, or below the previously activated cell).
However, if your cell phone is in edit mode, the rules change. A cursor appears in the cell (or in the formula bar), and anything you type will be aggregate to the cell, along with the content of the existing cell. Also, when a cell is in edit mode, the right, left, up, and down arrow keys on the keyboard cause the cursor to move within the cell.
So now that we’ve clarified the difference between activated cells and cells in edit mode, how do we actually activate a cell or a range of cells? You can use any of the three main ways listed below:
- Single mouse click on cell
- Use the keyboard’s left, right, up, and down arrow keys to navigate from a current selection to the cell you want to activate
- Type a reference to the cell in the ‘Name Box’ at the top left of the worksheet, e.g. To activate cell A2, type “A2” in the name box and then press return (or enter).
Note that you can easily see which cell is currently activated as it is highlighted in Excel with a thick black border.
Often in Excel you will want to select a range of cells. Note that even when you have a range of cells selected in Excel, only one of the cells within the range will be activated (shown by a thick black border). This means that when you enter data or text, this will overwrite the contents of the activated cell, and when you press the arrow keys on the keyboard, this will activate different cells within the selected range.
There are several ways to select a range of cells. You also can:
- Use the mouse to click the start of the range and drag across the range you want to select
- Type a reference to the cell range in the ‘Name Box’ at the top left of the worksheet, e.g. To select cells A1 through D4, type “A1:D4” in the name box, and then press the Return (or Enter) key.
- Activate a cell at the beginning of the range, then press the SHIFT key. With the SHIFT key still selected, use the mouse to click a cell at the end of the range.
- Activate a cell at the beginning of the range, then press the SHIFT key. With the SHIFT key still selected, use the left, right, up, or down arrow keys on your keyboard to increase or decrease the selected range, one cell at a time.
- Activate a cell at the beginning of the range, then press the SHIFT and CTRL keys. With these keys still selected, use the left, right, up, or down arrow keys on your keyboard to increase or decrease the current selected range to the end of the current data set (note that the selection will end at the next empty cell) .
If you want to select an entire row or column in a spreadsheet, click the row number on the left of the spreadsheet or the column letter at the top of the spreadsheet, or if you want to select entire spreadsheet, click the gray icon. /blue square at the top left of the worksheet.
Finally, we look at the three ways to put a cell into edit mode. You also can:
- Double click on the cell
Or select the cell you want to edit and then:
- Click on the formula bar
- Press F2
Initially, you may think that it is not necessary to learn all the different methods for activating, selecting, and editing cells. After all, as long as you know one way to select a range of cells, why bother learning 4 other ways to do the same thing? However, if you use Excel a lot, you’ll find that different methods are better suited to different situations, and in general, you’ll soon save a batch of time by quickly selecting the most suitable method each time.