To find something in Excel, you can use Control + F on Windows and Command + F on a Mac. Control F also works on a Mac. Once you’ve found something, you can press Return or Enter to “find again”. If you hold down the shift key, you can move through matches in the opposite direction. After you run a find, and the Find dialog is closed. You can repeat the last search with the keyboard shortcut Shift F4 on Windows, and Command G on a Mac. This is a handy way to step through matches without the find dialog blocking your view. To reverse direction, use Control + Shift + F4 on Windows, Command + Shift + G on a Mac. To do a find and replace, use Control + H on both Windows and Mac. Excel will open up the Replace dialog with the replace field visible and in focus. On windows, after you run Find all, you can use the arrow keys to step through results. Here’s a couple more quick tips on Find and Replace. Before you find, if you make a selection first, you automatically limit the search to that selection. So, if I select a column, I can more quickly find just what I want inside this column. Second, although Excel doesn’t support regular expressions, it does support two wildcards, the question mark (?), which matches one character, and the asterisk (*), which matches more than one character. So, for example, I can use a question mark to find both “gray” spelled with an “a” and “grey” spelled with an “e”. And I can use an asterisk surrounded by parentheses to remove everything in parentheses, including he parentheses, in these product descriptions.
Dave Bruns
Hi - I’m Dave Bruns, and I run Exceljet with my wife, Lisa. Our goal is to help you work faster in Excel. We create short videos, and clear examples of formulas, functions, pivot tables, conditional formatting, and charts.
