Copy and paste are one of, if not the most used keyboard shortcuts used by people all around the world. It’s simple, easy to learn, and highly efficient. No one wants to write the same text over and over again and copying and pasting help save time and energy. I will show you 5 methods of how to copy and paste multiple cells in Excel. You will learn how to copy series, how to drag the handle to copy and paste as well as a few clever shortcuts.
Copy and paste using just the mouse
The simplest method how to copy and paste multiple cells in Excel, and the one that is most widely used is to just use the mouse to copy and paste. You select the cells you want to copy, right-click in the selected area and click the ‘Copy’ button.
Next, select the cells you want to paste that information in. Right-click in the selected area and press ‘Paste’.
The values have been duplicated and you can do everything you could do with the original cell in the new cell.
Using the fill handle
If you want Excel to copy the same value again and again down a column, you can use the green dot (fill handle) on the bottom right of a cell through as many cells as you want to and fill them with that value. This technique can be handy when you need the same value throughout multiple cells. It makes your life easier and saves time rather than manually copying and pasting it for each cell.
To use the drag handle, you need to select the cell (or multiple cells) with the left mouse button and move your mouse to the bottom right corner of the range of cells until your mouse pointer turns into a cross. Draw this cross down and it will fill all the newly selected cells with the first values you selected.
Be careful though, dragging through already filled cells will replace their content.
Dragging the fill handle to fill series
You can use the same function to fill out a list. For example, you can make a list of months by typing January in the first cell and then drag down to fill out the remainder.
This can work with numbers, dates, months, etc. It can be super useful to save time from manually typing out every single one.
Here is the list of months I filled quickly using this option.
Shortcuts for Copying and Pasting Columns and Rows
Two less known shortcuts for copying and pasting either rows or columns quickly are Ctrl+D and Ctrl+R. The first shortcut Ctrl+D is used to automatically fill the values down (D => down), and the second shortcut Ctrl+R fills them to the right (R => right)
Using Ctrl+D to have a value spread down through a whole column
How to copy a column in Excel? When you need to fill down a column with a value, you can use the Ctrl+D keyboard shortcut. It instantly fills the selected cells with the first value selected which can again save you time compared to the old-fashioned copy and paste functions.
Using Ctrl+R to have a value spread through the whole row
You can use Ctrl+R the same way as Ctrl+D but instead of filling the column, you fill the selected row of cells with the wanted value. You can combine the two shortcuts to fill rows and columns at the same time.
Using Ctrl+Enter to have a value spread through the whole row
To copy a singular value through all selected cells, regardless of their location, you can use the Ctrl+Enter keyboard shortcut. It will copy and paste the only value in these cells thorugh all of them, regardless which one it is.
Conclusion
Here you have them – all five methods of how to copy and paste multiple values in Excel. Which one do you prefer and why? Do you know a copy and paste method we haven’t mentioned? If so, drop it in the comments down below and let me know what it is.
