5 Most Useful Hotkey Shortcuts for Windows - Ultimate Guide

Working on the computer can be a very tedious exercise for many people. Especially those of us who are less technologically inclined such as older people or those of us who just don’t spend a lot of time on the computer.

For these people, the start switch from working in person to working on the computer at home could have been very annoying. Especially for students who might have been used to writing things out by hand.

Now, many people might think students find the idea of being able to use a computer to do their school work great. Like they have won the proverbially “progressive jackpot.”

However, I happen to know a lot of students who actually prefer to write notes out by hand. There are quite a few good reasons for this, and I wouldn’t say they need to get with the times. They have valid reasons for wanting to write notes by hand.

Writing vs Typing

The first of these reasons is that it helps you remember things better. Writing by hand has been shown to help improve memory retention for the things you are writing about. This means for those of us without photographic memories, it can be a very helpful tool for studying or remembering things.

Another thing is that some people simply can’t afford or don’t want to bring a laptop around with them everywhere. Maybe they are worried about it getting stolen, they can’t afford it, or as I said, they just prefer pen and paper.

So, for these people, having to hand in all of your assignments digitally can be a real pain. It is just much more difficult to flow well when typing if you didn’t learn how to type efficiently. Specifically, if you didn’t learn how to touch type.

There is also the downside of typing that it cannot be done everywhere. You need a laptop, phone, tablet, power, and all the other things that come with electronic devices in order to type things.

On the other hand, a pad of paper and a pen are cheap and can be found almost anywhere. Heck, if you really needed to you could write stuff with a piece of coal on a leaf.

But I digress as most people probably will not be taking notes or doing work at a time where all they would have to write with is a piece of coal and a leaf. So, let us get back to the topic at hand.

Now, one of the most important skills someone could learn during this whole period of Corona, in my opinion, is how to touch type. Touch typing is the act of being able to type on a keyboard without looking at the keys.

In our modern world where more and more is being done on computers, this is an invaluable skill for someone to have. It makes writing anything much faster, as touch typing will always be quicker than handwriting at their peaks.

However, what that takes is just time and practice. You just need to put in the time and effort to try and learn how to type without looking, and you will be able to type faster and faster eventually.

What I want to teach you is some shortcuts for Microsoft Windows that I think are invaluable to anyone working on the computer. These are just things you need to be taught, and once you memorize them you will use them time and time again.

Ctrl + A, Ctrl + C, Ctrl + V

There are 2 commands that are used throughout all text editors and even just anywhere you can write or see text on a computer, and they are the commands of copying and pasting.

In order to copy a text, you must first highlight it. There are a couple ways to highlight things on a computer. The first and most simple is to simply click and drag on a given text. This will highlight the text you clicked on starting at the point where you clicked.

This is very useful if you have to quote a short passage of text, or if you just need a couple words to put into Google Translate or some other document.

Now, you can click and drag in order to highlight even single words, but a faster way to select a single word to be highlighted is to just double click on it. This will highlight just that word without the spaces around it.

If you want, you can even go further. Let's say you want to quickly highlight an entire paragraph. It can be slow and clunky to click and drag for this. So, with a simple triple click, you can highlight an entire paragraph.

Finally, let's say you want to highlight an entire text or an entire page. This is where the first hotkey shortcut comes in. All you need to do is press the ‘Ctrl’ key and then the ‘A’ key and you will select an entire page or text.

Now, let's say you want to copy whatever highlighted text you have in order to paste it into your document. All you have to do is highlight the text you want to copy, and then press the ‘Ctrl’ key and then the ‘C’ key. Your text is now copied.

To paste it, simply click in your document where you want the copied text to be pasted, and then press the ‘Ctrl’ key and then the ‘V’ key. Your text will now be pasted.

Alt + Tab and “Windows Key” + Tab

Perhaps something that would annoy a lot of people is constantly having to click around to go back and forth between different tabs on your computer. This can be especially annoying if you have to copy a lot of information from one document to another.

For instance, let's say you are plugging numbers into a spreadsheet. Or you are quoting a text for your school paper. To go back and forth between your document and the one you are copying from can be cumbersome.






Therefore, it can be helpful to know the two simple “movement” commands that allow you to jump between tabs seamlessly. These can help improve productivity and help you easily find whatever tab you were looking for. Especially if you keep a lot of tabs open.

The first hotkey command that allows you to jump through tabs like a carousel, is the ‘Alt’ + ‘Tab’ command. By pressing the ‘Alt’ key and then the ‘Tab’ key, you will jump to the next tab.

By continuing to hold the ‘Alt’ key after the ‘Tab’ key has been pressed, you can see the menu off all your currently open tabs. By tapping the ‘Tab’ key, you will then cycle through these tabs.

By letting go of the ‘Alt’ key, you will jump to whatever tab you had highlighted when you let go.

Let’s say however that you have a lot of tabs open. It can be annoying to have to hold the ‘Alt’ key down and constantly press the ‘Tab’ key to cycle through.

This is where using the “Windows Key” and then the ‘Tab’ key comes into play. This command will open a menu that will show all of your tabs, but stay open until you have selected a tab to jump to.

You can also close tabs and see the names of tabs from both of these menus. This makes organizing your tabs much easier.