How to Customize the QAT --Quick Access Toolbar-- in Office 2013 Applications

How to Customize the QAT --Quick Access Toolbar-- in Office 2013 Applications
Page content

Located at the top of both Word and Excel 2013, the Quick Access Toolbar does just what its name implies: It provides quick access to chosen tools that are otherwise buried in the ribbon or absent altogether. This is accomplished by adding shortcuts to the Quick Access Toolbar for ready access to commands, but unfortunately, you can’t add list type values, such as styles, spacing or indentation.

As an example of adding shortcuts, imagine you regularly read through large groups of data. You’d prefer to view the data in full screen, but unfortunately, Microsoft removed this view mode in the 2013 version of Excel. Or did it?

The Quick Access Toolbar actually supports numerous commands that are not on the ribbon, including the option Toggle Full Screen. Rather than avoiding this view mode or limping through a workaround, this article explains how to add this shortcut to the Quick Access Toolbar.

1. Click the Quick Access Toolbar drop-down menu in the top title bar and select More Commands.

2. Click the Choose Commands From drop-down arrow and select All Commands to access all available commands that can be added to the Quick Access Toolbar. Alternatively, you can choose between Popular Commands, Commands Not in the Ribbon, Macros and various tabs to filter the list to one of those selections.

3. Scroll to the appropriate entry in the list of commands, select it and click Add » to add it to the right pane. Click OK to accept the addition.

If you made a wrong selection, select it in the right pane and click Remove to delete it.

4. Find the new command at the right of the Quick Access Toolbar. Click the shortcut to activate the command.

In this case, after clicking the Toggle Full Screen shortcut, the Quick Access Toolbar also disappears, but you can click Esc to exit the full screen view mode.