21 Excel Shortcuts for HR: Boost Your Efficiency Instantly

As an HR practitioner, your days are often packed with a wide range of responsibilities — from managing employee data and tracking leave records to preparing reports and analyzing workforce metrics. Excel is likely one of your go-to tools for organizing and analyzing a lot of that information. But even if you’re comfortable navigating spreadsheets, there’s always room to work smarter — not harder.

Save Time in Excel

Knowing the right Excel shortcuts can save you valuable time, reduce repetitive tasks and make your workflow significantly more efficient. Whether you’re inputting dates and times, formatting data for reports, hiding rows and columns for cleaner presentations, or switching between multiple workbook windows, there’s a shortcut to help you get it done faster.

We’ve compiled 21 essential Excel shortcuts tailored to make your day-to-day work more productive. From inserting timestamps with a keystroke to toggling between formulas and values, these shortcuts can help you avoid unnecessary clicks.

You’ll also learn how to quickly insert new worksheets, format data as currency or dates, and even create charts on the fly — ideal for those HR reports that need a visual edge.

The goal here isn’t just to impress your colleagues with lightning-fast keystrokes (though that’s a bonus), but to free up time you can better spend on more strategic HR tasks. These shortcuts are especially useful if you find yourself handling large data sets or juggling multiple Excel files at once.

So, whether you’re new to Excel or looking to level up your existing skills, these shortcuts are worth keeping at your fingertips. Bookmark this list, print it out, or better yet, practice a few each day until they become second nature. Small efficiencies can lead to big results, and mastering these Excel shortcuts is one easy way to get ahead in your HR role.

21 Common Commands

To make it easier on yourself, here are keyboard shortcuts for 21 common commands:

1. CTRL+Shift+& — Outline border to the selected cells.
2. CTRL Shift # — Change Date format with day, month and year.
3. CTRL Shift @ — Change Time format with hour and minute, AM or PM.
4. CTRL Shift : – For the current time.
5. CTRL ; — For current date.
6. CTRL 9 — Hide selected rows.
7. CTRL 0 — Hide selected columns.
8. CTRL ` — Display Formulas/Alternate in the worksheet.
9. CTRL+K — To insert Hyperlink.
10. CTRL+H — Opens up the Find and Replace dialog box.
11. CTRL+R — Uses the Fill Right command to copy the contents and format of the leftmost cell of a selected range into the cells to the right.
12. CTRL+7 — Hides or displays the standard toolbar.
13. ALT+F1 — This creates a chart out of the data in the current range (selected cells). This is the most well-known feature of Excel, and now you know a new way to use it!
14. ALT+SHIFT+F1 — Inserts a new worksheet into a workbook.
15. F6 — Switches between the worksheet, Ribbon, task pane, and Zoom controls. This is probably the most useful shortcut of all. This cool shortcut is also the most beloved to all the anti-mouse users out there.
16. SHIFT+F6 – The reverse of the F6 shortcut.
17. CTRL+F6 – Switches to the next workbook window when multiple workbook windows are open.
18. CTRL+SHIFT+$ – Applies the currency format to the selected cells.
19. CTRL+`– Alternates between showing the value of a cell and the formula in the worksheet. Great for complex worksheets.
20. CTRL+D – Fill down command on the selected cells. Fill down copies the content and format of the topmost cell into the cells below.
21. CTRL+R – Fill right command on the selected cells. Fill right copies the content and format of the leftmost cell to the cells to the right.

For more Excel tutorials, quick-tip videos and articles, check out LearnExcelNow.