As you know, Excel sheet is frequently acclaimed as one of the most useful software that allows users to create spreadsheets, crunch numbers as well as prepare a business report. Usually, tapping the arrow keys to move from one cell to another. However, there are times when you might experience trouble in tapping them – for instance, they won’t work when you tap them.
This kind of problem can be quite frustrating since no matter what you do, especially when you tap the arrow keys, instead of a single cell, it moves the entire spreadsheet. If you are one of the users who experience this problem, worry no more for this post will guide you on what you can do to fix it.
When arrow keys won’t function as intended in Excel spreadsheets, it could be due to unintended behavior of the Scroll key or it could be related to some issues with the keyboard driver. Whatever the cause is, here are some suggestions you can check out to fix it.
Option 1 – Try to disable the Scroll Lock
The first thing you can do to fix this problem with arrow keys is to disable the Scroll Lock. Although doing this is easy, newer laptops don’t actually come with it so if your keyboard does not come with a scroll key, all you have to do is tap the Fn key and disable Scroll Lock. Aside from that, you could also use the on-screen keyboard to turn off the Scroll Lock. You will see its status on the Excel sheet which will help you to double-check. Moreover, you could also tap the Shift + F14 keys to toggle off the Scroll Lock. To use the on-screen keyboard to turn off Scroll Lock, follow the steps below.
- Tap the Windows key and type “on-screen keyboard” and then tap Enter.
- Once the on-screen keyboard is opened, you should see that the Scroll Lock is on the “On” position since the ScrLk keys are in blue.
- Like pointed out earlier, you can utilize the Scroll Lock indicator located in the status bar as well as disable or enable the scroll key by using this feature on Microsoft Excel.
Option 2 – Try turning on the Sticky key
If disabling the Scroll Lock did not fix the problem, you can try turning on the Sticky Key instead. A lot of users reported that this option fixed the problem for them. So you should try to turn on the Sticky key and to do that, follow the steps below.
- First, type “control panel” in the Start Search and click on Control Panel from the search results.
- Next, select the “Turn On Sticky Keys” option and click on OK.
- After that, go back and uncheck the “Turn On Sticky Keys” option. This should fix the malfunctioning arrow keys on Excel.
Option 3 – Try running the Hardware and Devices Troubleshooter
The first thing you can do to fix the problem is by running the Hardware Troubleshooter. Although it won’t make much of a difference, there’s still a possibility that it could automatically fix the problem with these function keys. To use it, refer to these steps:
- The first thing you need to do is click on Start and then on the gear-like icon to pull up the window for Settings.
- After opening Settings, look for the Update and Security option and select it.
- From there, go to the Troubleshoot option located on the left-hand side of the list.
- Next, select Hardware and Devices from the list and open the Troubleshooter and run it. Once it is doing its job, wait for it to complete the process and then restart the system.
- After the system restarts, check if the problem’s now fixed. If not, refer to the next option given below.
Option 4 – Update the keyboard driver
You can also update the keyboard driver to fix the problem. There are cases when an outdated or corrupted driver can fix the problem. To do so, follow the steps below.
- Tap the Win + R keys to open the Run dialog box.
- Then type “devmgmt.msc” in the field and hit Enter to open the Device Manager.
- From there, look for the keyboard driver and click on it.
- Next, right-click on the keyboard driver and select the Update driver option.
- After that, click the “Search automatically for updated driver software” option to proceed.
Option 5 – Reinstall the keyboard driver
If updating the keyboard driver didn’t help, then you might want to reinstall it. How? Follow the steps below.
- Tap the Win + R keys to launch Run.
- Type in MSC into the box and tap Enter or click OK to open the Device Manager.
- After that, a list of device drivers will be displayed. Look for the keyboard driver, right-click on it and then select “Uninstall device”.
- After that, unplug the device and restart your PC.
- Then plug your device back in. Assuming your device is connected to your PC, open the Device Manager again.
- Next, click on the Action button and click the Scan for hardware changes button. That should fix the problem
Note: You could also completely uninstall the driver and go directly to the manufacturer’s website and download the latest driver for your hardware and then install it.
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