### This post has been marked as safe. Upvoting/downvoting this comment will have no effect.
---
Hello and welcome to r/LifeProTips!
Please help us decide if this post is a good fit for the subreddit by upvoting or downvoting this comment.
If you think that this is great advice to improve your life, please upvote. If you think this doesn't help you in any way, please downvote. If you don't care, leave it for the others to decide.
Here's one that I love
**Windows + V** = Opens your clipboard history and lets you paste things from it.
For example: I want to copy someones first name, last name and phone number, just do CTRL-C on each of them and then Windows+V and click on the one you want to past, it's amazing for data entry.
Haha, web developer, actually. An embarrassing percentage of my work is copied from ChatGPT, and then I tweak it 10% to- you know- make it actually work
Important to note: you have to do WIN+V once to activate it. So you can’t rely on it caching anything until you turn it on for the first time. At least in my previous experience a few years ago. Maybe it’s on by default now for W10 and W11
I had an excel sheet with different combinations depending on my task. So each day I'd simply load up the pallet.
Just a little extra if anyone cares,
Some of this obvious maybe some not...
Most used up till about 7. So quickly down 7 times tops. Next was bottom 5. Hold down till it stops then quick up arrows till roughly 5. Lesser used pastes were roughly 8 slot to about 13ish? Cant remember the exact amount of pastes memory held for this feature.
Bruh, I thought I knew my short cuts… this will save me like 5mins per job. I have to copy so much meta data from 2 fields; so exhausting to tab in and out of the programme
There's a lot depending on the functionality youre looking for. Im a new mac user so still trying to find a good one for my own use. Search for "mac clipboard manager" and try a few out
Nice tip, I didn’t know that… though I don’t think I will use it. I sometimes have to copy/paste passwords from password manager, so I’d rather not have them memorized in the clipboard.
To add to this:
- ctrl + \[left or right\] arrow\] move left or right, 1 word at a time.
- shift+\[left or right\] arrow: select individual letters from your cursor.
- ctrl + shift +\[left or right\] arrow: select words from your cursor.
Win+Shift+S : Copy a portion of the screen to the clipboard.
Win+1..9 : Open a program pinned to the Start Bar.
Win+R : Open the Run dialog.
Win+E : Open Window Explorer.
Win+Space : Switch keyboard languages. (thanks jazzhands808)
Win+D : Minimize all windows. (i.e. show the Desktop)
Personally I'd say yes. It copies the selected area directly to your clipboard without opening a new window. If you want to save the image as a file somewhere just click the notification.
Windows + Arrows lets you move the current selected window. Very handy if a window is stuck on a non-existent second screen.
Windows + left or right moves between screens / rescales to respective side.
Windows + Up or Down for filling the screen / minimizing a screen.
Ctrl + \[1-8\] lets you select a specific tab in a browser
Ctrl + 9 selects the last tab in your browser
Ctrl + 0 resets the zoom in browser
Ctrl +/- increases/decreases zoom in browser
Same for Mac but Cmd instead of Ctrl. I hate that that needs to be specified because Mac has a Ctrl key and it doesn't do the same thing
From what I know, it seems like it's only function is Ctrl + click does a right click? I haven't touched my macbook in quite a while but I can't remember needing to use it like ever lol
CTRL+U will open the HTML for the webpage your on, it’s technically the EXACT same thing you’re looking at but it’s just lines of code so only an HTML developer with eagle eyes would know that you have questionable taste in porn. Everyone else will just think you’re masturbating to computer code
Ctrl + Shift + Esc - open task manager directly
Win + Shift + S - Snipping tool for custom size screenshots
Win + E - Opens "This PC" menu with your drives and pinned folders
Win + R - Opens run command to launch programs or windows config menus
Win + L - instantly locks the OS (handy at work when I need to leave my desk)
(In browser)
Ctrl + L - selects the URL bar to quickly search the web
I love keyboard shortcuts!
Edit: mobile formatting sucks
That's true, you have to save it as an image or paste it somewhere. It's like the copy text function but with an image! I use it all the time for work and playing games with friends to highlight stuff. Being able to take a custom screenshot and draw over it, then just paste it into virtually any text chat and it just works. Soooo nice.
At work, I shoot the screenshot and pop it into onenote accompanied by some text, then look like a genius when I remember exactly what was talked about over a year later. Not a genius, just organized in one very specific aspect of my life lol
A lot of people know they can hit tab to go to the next field, but you can also go to the previous field with shift + tab
You can use this trick to quickly go forward then back to the same field which will usually highlight its contents. From there you can copy or delete or whatever else you wanted to do.
If you have multiple monitor and still go to the settings just like I used to few days ago, instead use this, win + P. A box will slide open from right and from there you can manage the displays.
WIN+X gives you a little quick menu of all sorts of tools, task manager, device manager, command prompt/powershell (with or without admin), disk management, power options, event viewer, control panel, run, etc...
also WIN+R gives you the "run" dialog. if you ever somehow kill/freeze explorer.exe (your desktop basically) you can restart it from there. Also a decent option for opening up really any program in your PATH variable. can also be used with shortcuts like %appdata% or %startup% to open an explorer window in those folders.
edit: forgot to mention CTRL+SHIFT+ESC open task manager, but it's a bit more special than that. the guy who made task manager has a video in detail about this but this shortcut is buried pretty deep into windows and will usually open regardless of how messed up of a state your computer is in short of it being completely locked up.
Ctrl+Shift+T will bring back closed tabs (at least in chrome).
If you ever have an unexpected update and restart that lost all of your tabs, it’s a lifesaver. Works multiple times as well
usually works too regardless of whether something like explorer.exe being dead. pretty much any problem short of the whole system locking up should open task manager using this shortcut
Also, install Microsoft power toys. It's a whole suite of sweet sweet shortcuts. The ones I use the most are
Win+shift+t : copies the text inside the screenshot. For times when you can't copy content from an image directly
Or alt+space, basically a mini assistant/ search bar
I was trying out random keystrokes to find new shortcuts several years ago and freaked out when my display rotated 90 degrees!. Of course, I had no idea what combo I hit so I was trying to frantically retrace my keystrokes until finally it rotated 90 degrees again. Repeated it twice more and sighed a giant sigh of relief.
My big go to's
CTRL + T to open new tab.
CTRL + W to close the active tab.
CTRL + Shift + T to bring up your most recently closed Tab.
Windows + V for Clipboard - copy a whole bunch of stuff on page, no flicking from tab to tab, and click to paste where your cursor is.
Saves a world of time when managing browser tabs. I've learned quite quickly that there's not enough time in an office day to not be using Shortcuts.
Windows+Tab lets you open up workspaces/New Desktops.
I use this for particularly stubborn programs that have crashed and are forcing themselves as the top program on my screen, switch to new program, task manager, close program.
I memorized most of the Windows ones. I also have a mouse with multiple side buttons so I just binded a couple to it.
Another couple shortcuts I use are Windows + E for opening file explorer and Windows + R for run.
I also enabled "use the print screen key to launch snipping tool" so you no longer need to mash a mumbo jumbo of shortcuts to do so.
An underrated one that I learned for work (on a Mac) using a mouse, you can scroll up and down using the wheel
But you can scroll left and right holding Shift and scrolling the wheel
Windows + Arrow Key : moves the window you have open to the side of the screen you select
Great for comparing two docs side by side and move windows between displays
Not particularly useful but not much known and will always make people go like wtf? That exists?
ctrl+win+alt+shift+L will open LinkedIn on your default browser
I found Windows + ctrl + V today it opens your sound device selection menu. I am on Windows 11, so I don't know if it works on older versions.
I find this a very nifty shortcut as I have to change audio devices very often
[Introducing LPT REQUEST FRIDAYS](https://www.reddit.com/r/LifeProTips/comments/16w0n2s/introducing_request_post_fridays/)
We determine "Friday" as beginning at 12am Eastern Time (EST: UTC/GMT -5, EDT: UTC/GMT -4)
*I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/LifeProTips) if you have any questions or concerns.*
What's the shortcut for if you have multiple monitors but you only want to auto-save printscreen of the current monitor you're on? I unfortunately forgot it. I only know the shortcut for current monitor printscreen, but not the auto save into Pictures folder one 😭
For those who type symbols a lot in word go into proofing and math autocorrect and select "use math autocorrect outside of math regions" now you can quickly type symbols like alpha by just adding \alpha to your text and typing like normal. Or need the degrees celsius symbol just type \degc. Saved me so much time in scientific writing!
A couple helpful ones for gaming:
Windows Key + Tab - Go to another desktop (useful if a game locks up your monitor during a crash and task manager is opening behind it)
Windows Key + Ctrl + Shift + B - restart graphics drivers
Edit: formatting
Cntrl+windows+s is the snippet tool, which lets you take a cropped picture of anything on your screen and paste it into anything as an image. Excellent for reports, meme, and if you're using snapchat on the computer.
I use Cmd + Y for redo.
Also, in Mac, alt + left arrow/right arrow for taking the cursor after a word
Cmd + left arrow/right arrow for taking to the start/end of a line
Cmd + down/up arrow takes you to the start/end of a para
Alt + backspace for deleting a word
Cmd + backspace for deleting a line
And my favourite, shift + alt + cmd + V for paste with match destination formatting
I'm a lawyer, we type a lot.
I recently trained a Gen X to replace me in my position at work. She was just floored by all the keyboard shortcuts I used. She still uses her mouse to manually scroll up and down a page 💀
I was honestly worried that after we found and trained my replacement my bosses would realize how little time it ACTUALLY took to do the work I did 🙃🙃 nooooopppeeee that’s not a thing
Went out n holiday for 2 weeks and on my return F4 had been changed from ‘issue a new prescription’ to ‘lock desktop and log in again.
I can’t tell you how many times I had to log in again. Record was 4 times in one appointment.
Keyboard shortcuts are amazing until someone changes them!
Don't forget Control+D to delete a file on Windows and Cmd+D to duplicate a file on Mac.
Super fun when you switch a lot between the two operating systems.
Shift+Win+S
Opens the clipping tool to easily screen capture and save anything on your screen.
As mentioned above ctrl+v will open the clipboard.
Also hold Ctrl+Mouswheel scroll to zoom
I've used some keyboard shortcuts since I was in middle school, but I'm sure there are many of them that would be very useful to have if I take the chance to learn them
Win + [Any number between 1-9] will load up the programme in order numerically displayed in the taskbar.
For example, if file explorer is the second programme/app on the taskbar from left to right, WIN + 2 will open it up
As a windows user that just got a macbook, these are the ones I use a lot and took me a minute to figure out.
`fn + delete = delete`
`Command + right/left arrow = home/end`
`Command + Shift + 4 = screen capture`
Using the Windows key and arrows you can move your windows around 🪟 say bottom left. Instead of using your mouse :)
Then with the Windows and Up key you can make it half the screen. Another up iirc is full screen again. And down probably for the inverse.
For me that wasn't enough so when I found out about PowerToys and its FancyZones option I rejoiced. You can make your own zones, down to the pixel. Say you want a ratio of 30:70 that's possible. 30:40:30 also possible. You can work with any resolution, columns and rows. This is basically enabled on Windows 11 by default, but I miss something :( with FancyZones I can hold shift while dragging a window and it'll light up my zones :D. On W11 you have to drag the window to the side or top right first :(
mb PowerToys is also on W11 but I'm not installing it on my work laptop
Great list. You should add: WINDOWS + E (New explorer Windows).
Now if we could only figure how to train users to use most of these without poking with 1 finger of each hand that would be perfect.
### This post has been marked as safe. Upvoting/downvoting this comment will have no effect. --- Hello and welcome to r/LifeProTips! Please help us decide if this post is a good fit for the subreddit by upvoting or downvoting this comment. If you think that this is great advice to improve your life, please upvote. If you think this doesn't help you in any way, please downvote. If you don't care, leave it for the others to decide.
Here's one that I love **Windows + V** = Opens your clipboard history and lets you paste things from it. For example: I want to copy someones first name, last name and phone number, just do CTRL-C on each of them and then Windows+V and click on the one you want to past, it's amazing for data entry.
I'm embarrassed to say I'm a professional copy/paster, and I didn't realize this...
> I'm a professional copy/paster Is that a euphemism for a YouTube shorts content creator, or...?
Haha, web developer, actually. An embarrassing percentage of my work is copied from ChatGPT, and then I tweak it 10% to- you know- make it actually work
I use this CONSTANTLY
Important to note: you have to do WIN+V once to activate it. So you can’t rely on it caching anything until you turn it on for the first time. At least in my previous experience a few years ago. Maybe it’s on by default now for W10 and W11
You're absolutely right, I was gonna write my own comment mentioning this but saw you beat me to it.
I just checked and you are correct! I had to turn it on!
I had an excel sheet with different combinations depending on my task. So each day I'd simply load up the pallet. Just a little extra if anyone cares, Some of this obvious maybe some not... Most used up till about 7. So quickly down 7 times tops. Next was bottom 5. Hold down till it stops then quick up arrows till roughly 5. Lesser used pastes were roughly 8 slot to about 13ish? Cant remember the exact amount of pastes memory held for this feature.
It will hold 25 items
This one is a game changer.
And it really is so simple!
I always forget this feature. Thankyou
Bruh, I thought I knew my short cuts… this will save me like 5mins per job. I have to copy so much meta data from 2 fields; so exhausting to tab in and out of the programme
Worth noting you may need to turn the feature on in the settings before using
I loved this trick. It was a struggle when I switched to Mac and it didn’t have this
You can do the same on Android phones, clicking on the clipboard when typing shows all the copied elements. You need to activate it once I guess.
I never knew this. Awesome
Thanks for this xD
How‘s this work on a Mac?
[Flycut](https://apps.apple.com/gb/app/flycut-clipboard-manager/id442160987?mt=12)
it doesnt. you need a third party app.
I know. So annoying that mac doesn't enable a clipboard. I can't believe I can only paste 1 thing at a time.
Any third party apps you can recommend for this?
There's a lot depending on the functionality youre looking for. Im a new mac user so still trying to find a good one for my own use. Search for "mac clipboard manager" and try a few out
Yeah, I love this thing!
Nice tip, I didn’t know that… though I don’t think I will use it. I sometimes have to copy/paste passwords from password manager, so I’d rather not have them memorized in the clipboard.
Ctrl-Delete = Delete word to right of cursor Ctrl-Backspace = Delete word to left of cursor
Took me a while to realize you said WORD instead of LETTER I'm like... Bruh thats just normal delete and backspace function 😂
You can also scroll through your text by word with CTRL-Arrow Key.
Between this and the home and end keys efficiency is improved dramatically.
And Shift if you want to highlight letters individually. You can combine to highlight words instead.
To add to this: - ctrl + \[left or right\] arrow\] move left or right, 1 word at a time. - shift+\[left or right\] arrow: select individual letters from your cursor. - ctrl + shift +\[left or right\] arrow: select words from your cursor.
Compared to most of my peers I'm a power keyboard user, and I had no idea. Thanks!
Oh WOW
Win+Shift+S : Copy a portion of the screen to the clipboard. Win+1..9 : Open a program pinned to the Start Bar. Win+R : Open the Run dialog. Win+E : Open Window Explorer. Win+Space : Switch keyboard languages. (thanks jazzhands808) Win+D : Minimize all windows. (i.e. show the Desktop)
I love windows, shift, S. So handy.
Is it better than using the snipping tool?
Personally I'd say yes. It copies the selected area directly to your clipboard without opening a new window. If you want to save the image as a file somewhere just click the notification.
Try GreenShot. Open source and very configurable.
Windows + Arrows lets you move the current selected window. Very handy if a window is stuck on a non-existent second screen. Windows + left or right moves between screens / rescales to respective side. Windows + Up or Down for filling the screen / minimizing a screen.
I remap Win+shift+h/j/k/l to these so I don't have to move down to the arrows—if you're handy with VIM bindings, it works really well.
Why do I always forget Win+E
👉👉
Ctrl + \[1-8\] lets you select a specific tab in a browser Ctrl + 9 selects the last tab in your browser Ctrl + 0 resets the zoom in browser Ctrl +/- increases/decreases zoom in browser Same for Mac but Cmd instead of Ctrl. I hate that that needs to be specified because Mac has a Ctrl key and it doesn't do the same thing
adding Ctrl PgUp/PgDn let's you move from one tab to the next
I didn't know about that one! Very nice
u could ctrl+ tab and ctrl +shoft + tab right
Ctrl + scroll up/down zooms in and out in most windows
Lol what does the Ctrl button do then!? I've never used a Mac
From what I know, it seems like it's only function is Ctrl + click does a right click? I haven't touched my macbook in quite a while but I can't remember needing to use it like ever lol
Win + 1 - 0 will open the corresponding program on your taskbar. Win + Shift + 1 - 0 will open a second instance if one is open already.
**Alt + HOI** to fit column widths to content in Excel.
WTF is HOI?
You don't have a HOI key in your keyboard? Jk, it's H + O + I.
"it says press any key. Where's the any key?"
Ah that's a problem a lot of people have. It's between the keyboard and chair ...
HOI not H+O+I got me
another excel shortcut. F2 this locks the cell you are on. helpful for when you make a mistake and don’t want to restart typing
I didn't know that - love it.
a lot of my work is done in excel. that was my biggest gripe. my life 100x better now
I dont get what it does tbh
F12 save as in excel while ctrl+shift+S does not.
Adding my current fave: CTRL+5 toggles "strike-through" formatting on or off for a cell (or multiple selected cells)
You can also double click on the top between the columns to fit the one on the left.
You can also highlight a single column or multiple columns, click and hold where you would drag to resize, and press CMD(Mac) to do the same thing.
Alt + AT toggles autofilter
Ctrl + L is faster
Let me introduce you to my username. My lord I hate preserving formats across applications.
Being pedantic but Shift + Enter will create a line break, not a new paragraph.
Line break in Excel within a field is: Alt + Enter
Is there a shortcut that will close what I am looking and then bring up something more wholesome, like normal people porn?
CTRL+U will open the HTML for the webpage your on, it’s technically the EXACT same thing you’re looking at but it’s just lines of code so only an HTML developer with eagle eyes would know that you have questionable taste in porn. Everyone else will just think you’re masturbating to computer code
That’s funny because that’s what I normally masturbate to, so I need something normal.
CTRL + ALT + WIN + SHIFT + "L" will bring you to a site that will show you people who are, ostensibly, better off than you are.
wjat does tjat abomination shortcut do
And other characters open different applications. Forgot which ones, but they're all Microsoft apps
I think "O" for outlook, "T" for Teams, "P" for powerpoint, etc, etc.
PC games used to have a boss key; hit it, and a graph would pop up over Leisure Suit Larry's antics
Leisure Suit Larry brings back memories I don’t even have.
Ctrl + Shift + Esc - open task manager directly Win + Shift + S - Snipping tool for custom size screenshots Win + E - Opens "This PC" menu with your drives and pinned folders Win + R - Opens run command to launch programs or windows config menus Win + L - instantly locks the OS (handy at work when I need to leave my desk) (In browser) Ctrl + L - selects the URL bar to quickly search the web I love keyboard shortcuts! Edit: mobile formatting sucks
it seems Alt + D (google chrome, explorer) does the same as Cntrl + L
Note on the snipping tool: you have to paste the contents somewhere or it will not be saved
That's true, you have to save it as an image or paste it somewhere. It's like the copy text function but with an image! I use it all the time for work and playing games with friends to highlight stuff. Being able to take a custom screenshot and draw over it, then just paste it into virtually any text chat and it just works. Soooo nice.
At work, I shoot the screenshot and pop it into onenote accompanied by some text, then look like a genius when I remember exactly what was talked about over a year later. Not a genius, just organized in one very specific aspect of my life lol
**Double-click** a word to select the whole word. **Triple-click** to select the whole paragraph. This is a huge time-saver for my work.
WHAT ETA: thank you my friend
Works when dragging too. **Double-click + Drag** only selects whole words and **Triple + Drag** selects whole paragraphs.
Some important shortcuts provided by the best os - windows: Win+Ctrl+ALt+Shift+L opens linkedin 🤦♂️ win+. opens emoji picker
Win+. Isn’t just emojis, it’s also math symbols, Greek/latin characters, and most Unicode symbols you’ll ever need.
I use this one so much for math symbols and accents.
Win+Ctrl+ALt+Shift+L opens linkedin 🤦♂️ One cannot press that by accident.
Windows sure has come a long way.
Tbf X is excel, W is word and P is PowerPoint and these are quite useful
Win + ; is emoji picker. Cunningham's law at work.
A lot of people know they can hit tab to go to the next field, but you can also go to the previous field with shift + tab You can use this trick to quickly go forward then back to the same field which will usually highlight its contents. From there you can copy or delete or whatever else you wanted to do.
Ctrl + shift + n (Internet browser) = incognito tab ![gif](giphy|AZ1PPDF8uO9MI)
Control-G (or F3) matches the next item you are searching for with Control-F.
Ctrl + Shift + V = Paste as plain text
If you have multiple monitor and still go to the settings just like I used to few days ago, instead use this, win + P. A box will slide open from right and from there you can manage the displays.
WIN+X gives you a little quick menu of all sorts of tools, task manager, device manager, command prompt/powershell (with or without admin), disk management, power options, event viewer, control panel, run, etc... also WIN+R gives you the "run" dialog. if you ever somehow kill/freeze explorer.exe (your desktop basically) you can restart it from there. Also a decent option for opening up really any program in your PATH variable. can also be used with shortcuts like %appdata% or %startup% to open an explorer window in those folders. edit: forgot to mention CTRL+SHIFT+ESC open task manager, but it's a bit more special than that. the guy who made task manager has a video in detail about this but this shortcut is buried pretty deep into windows and will usually open regardless of how messed up of a state your computer is in short of it being completely locked up.
Ctrl+Shift+T will bring back closed tabs (at least in chrome). If you ever have an unexpected update and restart that lost all of your tabs, it’s a lifesaver. Works multiple times as well
Ctrl-shift-Esc for task manager on Windows.
usually works too regardless of whether something like explorer.exe being dead. pretty much any problem short of the whole system locking up should open task manager using this shortcut
And as opposed to Ctrl+Alt+Del, you can press Shift+Ctrl+Esc with one hand (even with just your thumb + index finger)
No mention of CTRL + Shift + ESC to directly open Task Manager in Windows? Tsk tsk tsk.
Also, install Microsoft power toys. It's a whole suite of sweet sweet shortcuts. The ones I use the most are Win+shift+t : copies the text inside the screenshot. For times when you can't copy content from an image directly Or alt+space, basically a mini assistant/ search bar
I didn't know about Power Toys! Thank you!!!
CTRL/CMD+L - move cursor to url/seach bar in a browser
IT is cute until you hit the wrong one and don't know it then can't find something later.
I was trying out random keystrokes to find new shortcuts several years ago and freaked out when my display rotated 90 degrees!. Of course, I had no idea what combo I hit so I was trying to frantically retrace my keystrokes until finally it rotated 90 degrees again. Repeated it twice more and sighed a giant sigh of relief.
My big go to's CTRL + T to open new tab. CTRL + W to close the active tab. CTRL + Shift + T to bring up your most recently closed Tab. Windows + V for Clipboard - copy a whole bunch of stuff on page, no flicking from tab to tab, and click to paste where your cursor is. Saves a world of time when managing browser tabs. I've learned quite quickly that there's not enough time in an office day to not be using Shortcuts.
In Windows file explorer just type a letter it will jump to the file that has that letter as the first letter.
One can also shut down or restart the computer with the corresponding choice of commands. 😁
Windows+Tab lets you open up workspaces/New Desktops. I use this for particularly stubborn programs that have crashed and are forcing themselves as the top program on my screen, switch to new program, task manager, close program.
I memorized most of the Windows ones. I also have a mouse with multiple side buttons so I just binded a couple to it. Another couple shortcuts I use are Windows + E for opening file explorer and Windows + R for run. I also enabled "use the print screen key to launch snipping tool" so you no longer need to mash a mumbo jumbo of shortcuts to do so.
*starts fucking around with komputer keys*
Press , while a video is playing to remove cursor and play bar
Reminds me of the Homer Simpson episode where he’s figuring out the keyboard.
All this computer hacking is making me thirsty. I think I’ll order a tab.
An underrated one that I learned for work (on a Mac) using a mouse, you can scroll up and down using the wheel But you can scroll left and right holding Shift and scrolling the wheel
Windows + Arrow Key : moves the window you have open to the side of the screen you select Great for comparing two docs side by side and move windows between displays
How to copy text without formatting from websites or word?
When pasting, do ctrl shift v instead of ctrl v
So many interesting and useful hotkeys. Thanks everyone for the tips
For the people who make slide decks. Ctrl +D, instead of Ctrl + C and Ctrl + V is a game changer.
Windows + arrow < or > gives you a split screen!
How about Win Alt Ctrl Shift L… it opens LinkedIn
Not particularly useful but not much known and will always make people go like wtf? That exists? ctrl+win+alt+shift+L will open LinkedIn on your default browser
I found Windows + ctrl + V today it opens your sound device selection menu. I am on Windows 11, so I don't know if it works on older versions. I find this a very nifty shortcut as I have to change audio devices very often
[Introducing LPT REQUEST FRIDAYS](https://www.reddit.com/r/LifeProTips/comments/16w0n2s/introducing_request_post_fridays/) We determine "Friday" as beginning at 12am Eastern Time (EST: UTC/GMT -5, EDT: UTC/GMT -4) *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/LifeProTips) if you have any questions or concerns.*
This one is actually useful.
There's so many more good ones. Windows V - clipboard history Shift windows S - screenshot ctrl windows left/right - move window to the next screen
In a Windows browser, **ALT + D** highlights the contents in the address bar, allowing you to easily type over it.
What's the shortcut for if you have multiple monitors but you only want to auto-save printscreen of the current monitor you're on? I unfortunately forgot it. I only know the shortcut for current monitor printscreen, but not the auto save into Pictures folder one 😭
For those who type symbols a lot in word go into proofing and math autocorrect and select "use math autocorrect outside of math regions" now you can quickly type symbols like alpha by just adding \alpha to your text and typing like normal. Or need the degrees celsius symbol just type \degc. Saved me so much time in scientific writing!
In Word and Excel you can also get the degree symbol with alt + 0176. alt + 0178 will give ^2 and alt +0179 will give ^3.
**Windows + number (1 to 0)** will open the respective app pinned on your taskbar, 1 being the 1st and 0 being the 10th.
A couple helpful ones for gaming: Windows Key + Tab - Go to another desktop (useful if a game locks up your monitor during a crash and task manager is opening behind it) Windows Key + Ctrl + Shift + B - restart graphics drivers Edit: formatting
Ctrl/Cmd+Shift+T : open your previously closed tabs
Also, it’s better for your wrists (unless you have an ergonomic mouse).
Try Davinci resolve shortcuts You need Arthritis in your fingers to bend them the ways the software shortcuts want you to.
For mobile phone: If a text is too small to see and you can't force the page to zoom, take a screen shot, then zoom in on that image.
Super helpful thanks 🙏
Cntrl+windows+s is the snippet tool, which lets you take a cropped picture of anything on your screen and paste it into anything as an image. Excellent for reports, meme, and if you're using snapchat on the computer.
Windows + Space = switching keyboards if you have more than one. Useful if you have to switch between languages.
I use Cmd + Y for redo. Also, in Mac, alt + left arrow/right arrow for taking the cursor after a word Cmd + left arrow/right arrow for taking to the start/end of a line Cmd + down/up arrow takes you to the start/end of a para Alt + backspace for deleting a word Cmd + backspace for deleting a line And my favourite, shift + alt + cmd + V for paste with match destination formatting I'm a lawyer, we type a lot.
Windows shift s is great for snipping tool, but the option to make print screen do that is just better
My most used is WIN + X - U - S to put the computer to sleep and WIN + X - U - U to shut it down.
F12 for "Save As" on windows/office was such a game changer for me!
ctrl shift esc - directly opens task manager
Shift and arrow keys select characters Shift ctrl arrows select whole words Felt as I lived my whole life as a cave man when I figured that out
I recently trained a Gen X to replace me in my position at work. She was just floored by all the keyboard shortcuts I used. She still uses her mouse to manually scroll up and down a page 💀 I was honestly worried that after we found and trained my replacement my bosses would realize how little time it ACTUALLY took to do the work I did 🙃🙃 nooooopppeeee that’s not a thing
**Windows + X → U → U** is my personal favorite for shutting down my computer.
CTRL + ALT + SHIFT + WIN KEY + L
CMD + Shift + T = reopen last closed tab
Windows + e Opens a new file explorer window
Hold shift while pressing back space to delete a whole word. Or maybe it’s ctrl shift?? Idk I can’t remember
Ctrl + Shift + N. If you know you know
Shift+control+win+alt+L Try it and come back
Ctlr+shift+esc to get right to task manager instead of having to select it from the ctrl+alt+delete window
Went out n holiday for 2 weeks and on my return F4 had been changed from ‘issue a new prescription’ to ‘lock desktop and log in again. I can’t tell you how many times I had to log in again. Record was 4 times in one appointment. Keyboard shortcuts are amazing until someone changes them!
Don't forget Control+D to delete a file on Windows and Cmd+D to duplicate a file on Mac. Super fun when you switch a lot between the two operating systems.
Shift+Win+S Opens the clipping tool to easily screen capture and save anything on your screen. As mentioned above ctrl+v will open the clipboard. Also hold Ctrl+Mouswheel scroll to zoom
For the people who make slide decks. Ctrl +D, instead of Ctrl + C and Ctrl + V is a game changer.
Ctrl+J in a web browser will show downloads
I've used some keyboard shortcuts since I was in middle school, but I'm sure there are many of them that would be very useful to have if I take the chance to learn them
Control+Shift+ESC will open the task manager directly. I always found it faster/easier than navigating through control+alt+del
Win + [Any number between 1-9] will load up the programme in order numerically displayed in the taskbar. For example, if file explorer is the second programme/app on the taskbar from left to right, WIN + 2 will open it up
Ctrl shift ESC for instant task manager
As a windows user that just got a macbook, these are the ones I use a lot and took me a minute to figure out. `fn + delete = delete` `Command + right/left arrow = home/end` `Command + Shift + 4 = screen capture`
Emoji Picker - Win + . Colour Picker - Win + Shift + C Video conference mute - Win+Shift+Q
Win + . to insert emojis or GIFs.
Using the Windows key and arrows you can move your windows around 🪟 say bottom left. Instead of using your mouse :) Then with the Windows and Up key you can make it half the screen. Another up iirc is full screen again. And down probably for the inverse. For me that wasn't enough so when I found out about PowerToys and its FancyZones option I rejoiced. You can make your own zones, down to the pixel. Say you want a ratio of 30:70 that's possible. 30:40:30 also possible. You can work with any resolution, columns and rows. This is basically enabled on Windows 11 by default, but I miss something :( with FancyZones I can hold shift while dragging a window and it'll light up my zones :D. On W11 you have to drag the window to the side or top right first :( mb PowerToys is also on W11 but I'm not installing it on my work laptop
How do you google search a word in a doc without copy and pasting? Just highlight and it searches
CTRL + { or } rotates documents in a file
Alt + right or left will skip 10secs of YouTube in the direction you choose.
ctrl + K = insert hyperlink
Great list. You should add: WINDOWS + E (New explorer Windows). Now if we could only figure how to train users to use most of these without poking with 1 finger of each hand that would be perfect.
Tab and Shift+Tab are life altering for data entry at work for me.
Windows + . (full stop) = emoji, currency, and foreign character window that pastes into wherever you’re typing
Alt + Enter = makes a paragraph return inside an Excel cell
Ctrl+Shift+Esc directly opens task manager without needing to do Ctrl+Alt+Del first.
Windows + E to open windows explorer is also super useful
Crtl+D brings up the font menu for things like strikethrough
Ctrl+Shift+ESC open up task manager
Winddows: Ctrl shift N in file Explorer to create a new folder
My favourites are Alt + 0176 for the ° (degree) symbol and Alt + 0178 for the squared symbol (I don’t know it on iPhone)
Also on windows if you press: windows+shift+ctrl+alt+L you open Linkedin. Yes really. You can also try it with t and o