Moving More than One Cell to the Right

Tawna can configure Excel to move in any of four directions when she presses Enter. She wonders if it is possible to make Excel move a specific number of cells to the right upon pressing Enter.

As Tawna notes, Excel allows you to configure the program so that when you press Enter, you'll move in any of four directions.

1. Display the Excel Options dialog box. (In Excel 2007 click the Office button and then click Excel Options. In Excel 2010 or a later version display the File tab of the ribbon and then click Options.)
2. At the left of the dialog box click Advanced. (See Figure 1.)



Figure 1. The Advanced options of the Excel Options dialog box.

3. Under Editing Options, make sure that the checkbox for "After pressing Enter, move selection" is checked (it should be by default).
4. Using the Direction drop-down list, change the direction as desired. Changing the direction affects how Excel behaves in all workbooks.

Note that the configuration is for direction only; you cannot specify how many cells you want to move in any particular direction—which is what Tawna wants to do.

There are several ways that you can accomplish the task at hand. Let's say that you want, when pressing Enter, to move 4 cells to the right. One way is configure Excel to move to the right (using the steps above) and then hide columns you want to skip over. So, for instance, let's say that after entering something in column C you want to skip over column D:F and make your next entry in column G. All you would need to do is to hide columns D:F, then when you press Enter, you'll end up in column G.

This approach is great if you always know where you will start and you always want to skip a set number of columns. It is not so great if you aren't entering information in such a structured manner. Instead, you may want to utilize a cell (and worksheet) protection approach. Follow these steps:

1. Select all of the cells in which you'll want to enter information. (Select the first cell, and then hold down the Ctrl key as you click on each of the others.)
2. Press Ctrl+1 (that's the number 1). Excel displays the Format Cells dialog box.
3. Make sure the Protection tab is displayed. (See Figure 2.)



Figure 2. The Protection tab of the Format Cells dialog box.

4. Clear the Locked checkbox.
5. Click on OK to close the dialog box.
6. Make sure the Home tab of the ribbon is displayed.
7. Click Format in the Cells group, and then choose Protect Sheet. Excel displays the Protect Sheet dialog box. (See Figure 3.)



Figure 3. The Protect Sheet dialog box.

8. Clear all of the check boxes except for Select Unlocked Cells (it should be the only one selected).
9. You do not need to enter a password. Just click on OK.

Now when you press Enter in the worksheet, you are moved to the next unlocked cell, in the direction you specified in the earlier steps described in this tip. It is only the cells that you unlocked that are selected, in turn.

Finally, you could use a macro to handle the movement for you. Here are two that implement a simple approach:

Sub MoveXRight()
    'Enter number > 1 in designated cell
    'Moves that number of cells to the right
    Dim n As Integer

    n = Sheets("Sheet1").Range("A1")
    ActiveCell(0, n + 1).Select
End Sub

Private Sub Workbook_SheetChange(ByVal Sh As Object, ByVal Target As Range)
    If Sheets("Sheet1").Range("A1") > 1 Then
        MoveXRight
    End If
End Sub

Note that the second macro should be placed in the ThisWorkbook module, as it is an event handler. Each time that it is triggered, the other macro (MoveXRight) is executed. It pulls a value from cell A1 on Sheet1 and then moves that number of cells to the right. To use the macro, simply enter a value in cell A1 of Sheet1 that indicates how many cells you want to move. To have Enter work like normal, just place a 0 or 1 into cell A1.

ExcelTips is your source for cost-effective Microsoft Excel training. This tip (10554) applies to Microsoft Excel 2007, 2010, 2013, 2016, 2019, Excel in Microsoft 365, and 2021.