Keyboard Shortcut to Lock Cells in Excel (Mac Office)

Sat, Feb 28, 2009

Miscellaneous


I seem to be surrounded by Mac users, and I realised that there are some differences when using Mac Office and Windows Office. One example is if I wanted to lock a cell, say for example A1. I would put the dollar sign ($) in from of both the column and row number as follows: $A$1.

This still works in the Mac world if I enter it manually, but in the Windows version of Excel, there was a keyboard shortcut (highlight A1 in the formula bar and then press the F4 button) which would put the $ signs in for you. This method is, by far, very much less tedious than typing the dollar sign each time and moving the mouse to precisely the right location.

However, F4 doesn’t work in Mac. It was only after poking around did I find out that the Mac keyboard shortcut equivalent is not F4, but Apple key + T.

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- Alvin is a Singaporean who's interested in marketing, techy stuff and likes to just figure out how the two can work with each other. On top of his blog, you can also follow him on Twitter.

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23 Comments For This Post

  1. G Web Says:
    March 12th, 2009 at 10:54 am

    Apple – Think Differently….this post definitely proves that….heheheheheh….there are two kinds of computer users – those who have Macs and those that wish they do….I belong to the latter group.

  2. alwyn Says:
    March 26th, 2009 at 11:44 pm

    this was very helpful. thanks…been trying to find the damm F4 equivalent in mac excel haha

  3. Thomas Says:
    July 3rd, 2009 at 9:17 am

    Thanks!

  4. Lee Says:
    July 29th, 2009 at 3:47 pm

    Thank you so much!
    Do you what that command is called? I want to change the keyboard shortcut under view >> customize toolbars and menus.

    Thanks again!

  5. Alvin Says:
    July 29th, 2009 at 5:15 pm

    While I do know how that command functions, unfortunately I have no clue what it’s called :P

  6. Liz Says:
    August 16th, 2009 at 7:15 pm

    New to mac, the excel program is driving me insane. But I’m trying. I’m largely self-taught on the program too.

    I’m building a budgeting sheet right now. I’ve got several columns that fill in automatically. I want to ensure that I can’t accidentally modify the contents of these cells/interfere with the formula once I’ve set it up (I’m using a laptop…it happens!). Is there a way of selecting columns and cells to keep the format from being changed?

    Also, is the, erm, command key the same as the old Apple key? I had a mac as a kid…but don’t remember.
    Thanks!

  7. Alvin Says:
    August 16th, 2009 at 11:32 pm

    Hey Liz, I’m more of a Windows-guy, so I don’t really know about the command key and old Apple key. However, I do know that you can protect cells from being edited – this can be found in the Format > Protection menu in Windows

  8. Jt Says:
    September 10th, 2009 at 9:04 pm

    Hey dude, U rock, I short of words to explain how much your tip has helped me. Many thanks

  9. Faith Says:
    November 30th, 2009 at 9:09 am

    Hi there

    I’ve owned my very first IMac for two days now and I follow all the instructions I read on how to protect certain cells in one of our Excel spreadsheets (we easily did this when using Microsoft Excel on a PC) but the MAC version of Excel seems to only let you protect the whole sheet or nothing, there is not an option to just protect some of the cells. There’s got to be a way, I’ll just have to keep on searchin! Any help would be greatly appreciated.

  10. Alvin Says:
    November 30th, 2009 at 10:48 am

    hey there! maybe this would help? http://www.uwgb.edu/compserv/ehelp/excel/protect.htm

  11. Faith Says:
    November 30th, 2009 at 5:36 pm

    Thanks, but this I had already tried when I made my post. Didn’t work at all for MAC but yes, this is how we had been doing it on our Microsoft PC.

  12. Amit Says:
    January 29th, 2010 at 6:20 am

    thanks for that. its very useful information as I am new to mac.
    cheers

  13. Nadz Says:
    July 7th, 2010 at 6:55 am

    Thanks!

  14. Anthony Says:
    August 1st, 2010 at 1:52 am

    Thank you :)

  15. jerrin Says:
    November 22nd, 2010 at 10:31 pm

    thank you : )

  16. Kalle Says:
    November 23rd, 2010 at 1:36 pm

    Thank you, but fuck I hate Excel for Mac.

  17. Ken Says:
    December 1st, 2010 at 1:16 am

    thank you. ditto Kalle.

  18. Den Says:
    February 10th, 2011 at 12:47 am

    Thank you, ditto Kalle.

    Methinks Gates sabotaged it

  19. Tyler Says:
    February 15th, 2011 at 1:37 pm

    Thanks, ditto Kalle.

    This is just Microsofts way of getting back at Macs taking over.

  20. Brian Says:
    February 22nd, 2011 at 12:45 am

    Anyone figure out how to edit a cell with a keyboard shortcut – on Windows it’s [F2] but for the life of me I can’t find anything on the Mac equivalent. How retarded is Microsoft? Or rather, how retarded are their product guys?

  21. Alvin Says:
    February 22nd, 2011 at 1:22 am

    http://www.alvinpoh.com/how-to-edit-cell-with-a-keyboard-shortcut-in-mac-excel/ :)

  22. Julie Says:
    March 23rd, 2011 at 12:04 pm

    THANK YOU SO MUCH!!!! :)

  23. Tom Says:
    June 10th, 2011 at 4:53 am

    Thanks mate, well found

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