The people who look effortless in Excel aren't smarter; they just stop fighting their spreadsheets. Pasting values only is the move that separates them from everyone else: no broken formulas, no clashing formatting, just clean numbers exactly where you want them. Learn it once and you'll use it every day.
Step by step
- Copy the cells with Ctrl+C.
- Select the cell where you want to paste.
- Press Ctrl+Alt+V to open the Paste Special dialog.
- Press V to choose Values, then press Enter.
Tips & troubleshooting
- Use this to freeze the result of a formula so it no longer changes when the source data does.
- In the same dialog, T pastes formats only and E transposes rows into columns.
- Paste Special only appears after you've copied something. If nothing happens, copy the cells again first.
What pasting values keeps and what it drops
A normal paste copies everything about a cell. Paste values copies only what the cell currently shows as its result.
- Kept: numbers, text, dates and the calculated results of formulas.
- Dropped: the formulas themselves, fonts, colours, borders, number formats, conditional formatting, data validation and notes.
- Because number formats are dropped, a date pasted into an unformatted cell can appear as a number such as 46304. The value is right; press Ctrl+1 and choose a date format, or use Values and number formats (U in the Paste Special dialog) to bring the format along.
A worked example
You have used a lookup formula in column C to pull prices from another workbook, and you need to email the sheet without the link to that file. Select column C, press Ctrl+C, and without moving press Ctrl+Alt+V, then V, then Enter. The prices are now plain numbers in the same cells. The link is gone, the file opens without an update warning, and the figures can no longer change behind your back.
Other ways to paste values
- Ctrl+Shift+V: in current Microsoft 365 versions of Excel this pastes values in one step, with no dialog. If it does nothing, your version predates it, so use Ctrl+Alt+V.
- Ctrl+V, then Ctrl, then V: paste normally, tap Ctrl on its own to open the Paste Options button, then press V for Values.
- Right-click the destination cell and choose the Values icon (a clipboard marked 123) under Paste Options.
- Home tab: click the arrow under Paste and choose Values.
More from the same dialog
Paste Special is worth learning beyond V. After Ctrl+Alt+V, press one letter and Enter.
- T pastes formats only, which copies the look of a cell onto others.
- W pastes column widths.
- E transposes, turning a row into a column or the reverse.
- D adds the copied number to the cells you paste onto, and M multiplies. Copy a cell containing 1.2, paste special with M onto a price list, and every price rises by 20%.
On a Mac
In Excel for Mac, Control+Cmd+V opens the Paste Special dialog. Choose Values and press Return.