Shortcuts to manage Excel pivot tables

Here is a selection of the best keyboard shortcuts to manage Excel pivot tables. Excel Pivot Tables, Excel Pivot table in English, allow you to cross reference data in a file very efficiently. Whether the source is a flat CSV file, another Excel tab, an SQL source such as a SQL Server table or an SSAS cube.

First of all, how can you manipulate pivot tables efficiently in Excel and save time and productivity on your projects? Here are seven Excel shortcuts specific to pivot tables created in Excel.

Best Office shortcuts to handle dynamic tables

For starters, people working in finance are familiar with many facets and features of Excel. However, many Excel users are not familiar with pivot tables, but only with the classic tables. Here, for example, is a selection of the best Excel shortcuts to manage pivot tables. The goal here is to answer the following questions with simple but effective shortcuts.

• How to select the whole pivot table?
• Or how to group or separate elements in my Excel pivot table?
• How do I hide elements of the pivot table?
• What shortcut can I use to create a chart from the data in an existing table?

Seven shortcuts to manage MS Excel pivot tables

Excel action	Excel shortcut
Check or uncheck a box for a field.	SPACE
Group elements of an Excel pivot table.	ALT + SHIFT + RIGHT ARROW
Separate elements of an Excel pivot table.	ALT + SHIFT + LEFT ARROW
Hide an element of an Excel pivot table.	CTRL + – (Minus sign)
Create a chart from the table data in the same Excel tab.	ALT + F1
Create a chart from the table data in a new Excel tab.	F11
Open the Excel Pivot Table Wizard.	ALT + D + P

In the same way, the use of “pivot tables” is very widespread among finance, accounting and data professionals. In fact, they allow you to analyse a large amount of data in just a few clicks.

To conclude , shortcuts are useful once mastered and especially with powerful data analysis tools such as pivot tables. To go further, here is an article on how to better manage the common Excel errors such as #VALUE, #NA or #DIV0.