Dragging the fill handle down a few thousand rows is nobody's idea of fun. Fill Down copies a value or formula into every selected cell instantly, however far the selection goes.
Step by step
- Select the cell containing the formula or value, together with the cells below it that you want to fill.
- Press Ctrl+D. The top cell is copied into every selected cell below.
- To fill across instead, select the cell and the cells to its right and press Ctrl+R.
Tips & troubleshooting
- Combine it with Ctrl+Shift+Down Arrow to select down to the end of your data first.
- Relative references adjust as they fill. Lock any that shouldn't move with F4.
- Ctrl+' (apostrophe) copies the formula from the cell above into the active cell without adjusting references.
Three ways to fill, and when to use each
- Ctrl+D: best when you have already selected the destination, or when the range is very long. With a single cell selected, it copies the cell directly above.
- Double-click the fill handle, the small square at the bottom-right of the selected cell. Excel fills down as far as the neighbouring column has data. Quick, but it stops at the first gap in that neighbour.
- Ctrl+Enter: select all the cells first, type a value or formula, and press Ctrl+Enter to put it in every selected cell at once. This also works on cells that are not next to each other.
Fill down is a copy, not a series
Ctrl+D repeats exactly what is in the top cell, so 1 becomes 1, 1, 1. For a sequence such as 1, 2, 3 or Monday, Tuesday, drag the fill handle instead, or use Home, Fill, Series. In Microsoft 365, =SEQUENCE(100) produces the numbers 1 to 100 in one formula.
Ctrl+D also copies the top cell's formatting, including borders and number format. If you only want the formula, paste it with Paste Special and choose Formulas.
Fill every blank with the value above
Reports exported from other systems often list a category once and leave the rows beneath it blank. To fill the gaps so the data can be sorted and filtered:
- Select the column.
- Press F5, choose Special, select Blanks and confirm. Only the empty cells are now selected.
- Type = and press the Up Arrow once, so the formula points at the cell above.
- Press Ctrl+Enter. Every blank now shows the value above it.
- Copy the column and paste it back as values to make the result permanent.
On a Mac
In Excel for Mac press Cmd+D to fill down and Cmd+R to fill right.