Must Know Shortcut Keys for Designers

Articles March 14, 2008 by Cadence Wu

Written by Jacob Cass

A must know list of very handy shortcut keys for any blogger or designer that is serious about time…You must learn these shortcut keys!

Quicker Web Surfing Using FireFox Shortcut Keys

CTRL+CLICK: Opens a link in a new tab. SHIFT+CLICK opens it in a new window. A middle mouse button will also allow you to open in a new tab.

CTRL+PGUP and CTRL+PGDN: Scroll through all the tabs you have open.

CTRL+T: Open a new tab.

CTRL+W: Close the current tab.

CTRL+F: Search or find text in a webpage. Also press “/” for a quick search version.

PGUP, PGDN: Scroll the page up and down.

CTRL+HOME, CTRL+END: Get to the top of bottom of a page.

F11: Full-screen mode. Very useful to get rid of your toolbars and useful for displaying your work to clients.

CTRL+U: View the page source.

RIGHT CLICK: Check out the right click for heaps of other options.

For more Firefox shortcut keys.

Mac OS X Keyboard Shortcuts

Appleâ€™s official shortcut key page.

Windows Shortcut Keys

ALT+TAB: This is the best shortcut there is as it lets you scroll through your open programs.

WINDOWS KEY+D: Minimize all windows and show your desktop. (My favorite)

WINDOWS KEY+E: Opens My Computer in Windows Explorer. Also very time saving.

SHIFT+DELETE: Skip the Recycling Bin and delete the file for good.

CTRL+SHIFT+ESC: Open the Task Manager. The same as good olâ€™ CTRL+ALT+DELETE

For more Microsoft Windows shortcuts.

Must Know Text Keyboard Shortcuts

CTRL+A: Select all the text on the page. Combined with CTRL+C (copy) and CTRL+V (paste), you can move large amounts of text very quickly.

ALT+MOUSE DRAG: Hold down ALT while you highlight text lets you highlight text in a block fashion. Great if you have text in columns as you can highlight just one of the columns for copying or cutting.

CTRL+Z and CTRL+Y: Every designer knows of CTRL+Z (undo) however how many of you know about CTRL+Y which allows you to skip forward in your changes that you made when you went backwards.

CTRL+UP or DOWN ARROW KEYS: Move up a paragraph at a time instead of just one like at a time. Usually you would just move one line up but this allows you to move one paragraph at a time.

CTRL+LEFT or RIGHT ARROW KEYS: Move through your sentence a word at a time rather than one character at a time.

CTRL+SHIFT+ARROW KEYS: Highlight paragraphs, words and letters in an easy manner using the arrow keys. Combine with copy and paste.

HIGHLIGHT+TAB: You can move what ever is highlighted several lines over. Highlight the text then click tab. This would be great for any web developers or bloggers.

More Shortcut Keys

Microsoft Office Shortcut Keys

Microsoft Word shortcut keys
Microsoft Excel shortcut keys
Microsoft FrontPage shortcut keys
Microsoft Outlook shortcut keys

Design Shortcut Keys

Photoshop Shortcut Keys
Illustrator Shortcut Keys
Dreamweaver Shortcut Keys
Indesign Shortcut Keys (PDF)

Other

F1 – F12 function keys
Linux / Unix shortcut keys
Microsoft Internet Explorer shortcut keys
Keyboard terms and meanings

I hope you enjoyed this great list of shortcut keys for designers and bloggers, if so, please leave a comment. Also, if I have missed any valuable shortcuts let me know.

18 Responses

Adam - March 14, 2008 at 9:11 am

Hey Gino,

This is a great post. I started posting these one at a time before but will now probably just reference this post from my blog. This is list pretty much covers everything you will ever need. Thanks.

Adam
Gino - March 14, 2008 at 5:14 pm

Yeah if you really think about it and try and calculate how much time you would save using shortcuts instead of doing things a longer way it can really add up to a lot of time. Every second counts!
details - March 14, 2008 at 5:26 pm

thanks for this! i’ve been thinking about creating a list of my own, but as adam said, i’ll probably just link to this post. :) a great collection.

.details.
Armen - March 15, 2008 at 5:10 pm

Nice post, Jacob!

I really must sit down and learn a few more shortcuts, to help me work in a more productive way.

Thanks for this.
Senior Web Designer - March 15, 2008 at 8:39 pm

hey Gino,
Nice Collection of Shortcuts i would like to add for Firefox you can use:

Ctrl 1 … go to the first Tab
Ctrl 2 … go to the Secound Tab
etc…

and to change to the next tab you can always use Ctrl Tab

Hope you like it and thanks alot Gino for your nice collection

Mohammed
Karen - March 16, 2008 at 6:32 pm

Good stuff! I heart my keyboard, seriously. I barely touch my mouse these days. I don’t know how I’d possibly be able to use Photoshop without shortcut keys, or even use the computer in general.
Gino - March 17, 2008 at 12:25 am

Yeah there are so many great shortcuts that remain hidden to most people. If you can take a week to master using them then you will work much more efficiently.
Gino - March 17, 2008 at 12:25 am

Mohammed – Thanks for the additions to the list!
Glen L Graham - March 17, 2008 at 1:50 pm

Thanks Gino great post
great shout cuts I’m always looking for quicker solutions for repetitive tasks.
You wouldn’t happen to know any auto posting software for mac users.
Jacob Cass - March 18, 2008 at 1:51 am

Thanks everyone for the comments and Mohammed for the other shortcuts.
abhishek - March 19, 2008 at 8:12 am

Great list of shortcuts.
Kofi Ansah - March 19, 2008 at 8:34 am

Great!
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Egypt Web Designe - July 18, 2008 at 12:32 am

Thanks for this great post
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Ahmed Elmasry - September 15, 2008 at 12:32 pm

very useful , thank you
egyptian web designer - February 27, 2009 at 9:10 pm

thanks for the Great list
alex - September 30, 2009 at 10:59 am

Thank You a Lot , I am new to the designing your effort for this short cut keys will help me a lot, Thanks once again