When Col inserts cells into a worksheet (not rows, but cells), the process seems to take longer than it should because he always has to check to see if Excel will shift the displaced cells down or to the right. He always wants the cells to be shifted downward, so he is wondering if there is a way to make "shift down" the default.
As Col implied, when you choose some cells and the use the Insert Cells command, Excel displays a dialog box where you can indicate how you want the displaced cells shifted. This process can, indeed, seem to take quite a while if all you ever want to do is shift down when you insert. Unfortunately, there is no way to change the default in Excel.
The solution is to use a macro to do your inserting. It doesn't need to be a long one; for instance, the following will shift cells down when inserting:
Sub ShiftDown()
Selection.Insert Shift:=xlDown
End Sub
Assign the macro to the Quick Access Toolbar or to a shortcut key, and you can easily shift cells down as you insert. All you need to do is to select the cells (or, indeed, entire rows) and then use the macro. If you want to create variations of the macro that always shift in different directions, all you need to do is change xlDown to xlUp, xlLeft, or xlRight.
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