Your Trello game is strong. You’ve mastered some big moves slinging cards across lists like Serena Williams on the court, kicking your to-do list’s butt, and completing due dates at rapid speed.
I imagine you’ve taken things to the next level adding Power-Ups to your boards as fast as Lizzo drops her next hit.
Perhaps, you’ve even cozied up to the easy automation that Butler brings to your workflow.
Luckily, you’re in the right place, because I’m going to show how a touch of fancy finger work can take your productivity to new heights.
What am I talking about? Shortcuts! Trello keyboard shortcuts to be exact.
In fact, Trello is loaded with handy shortcuts that can help you shave time and free your mind to work on more important tasks (like figuring where to order lunch from today).
While everyone’s favorite shortcuts are unique to their personal workflow, I’m going to share my seven favorite keyboard shortcuts that anyone can take away and start using today.
Of course, you can always just hit the question mark key (?) while on a Trello board to bring up the keyboard shortcuts menu. (We’ll consider that tip a freebie )
Insert A Card Anywhere
Let’s start with the basics: You’ve got a brand new board that needs cards or you have new cards you need to add to a board that is already in motion. Simply press the ‘n’ key to add a new card to a list.
You can also hover your mouse over a card that already exists and press ‘n’ to add a new card right below the hovered card.
✨ Bonus: While not a keyboard shortcut, double-click in between any two cards on a list to add a new card into that position!
Assign Yourself Or Delegate
With all of your new cards on your board, someone needs to own those tasks to start getting things done. If that lucky person is you, simply tap the spacebar while mousing over a card or when the card is open to add yourself to it.
Tapping the spacebar on a card that you’ve been added to will remove you from it (should you come to your better judgment).
While picking up your fair share of the work is what makes you a team player, the best leaders delegate, and delegate quickly you shall when you tap the ‘a’ key to reveal the ‘assign members window’ while either a card is open or when hovering over a card.
Stay Organized And On Time With The Due Date Shortcut
Keeping things moving along often requires a deadline, because otherwise, you would just be at the beach letting your cards age, blissfully unaware of the bottlenecks you’ve created.
To hold yourself and your teammates accountable, due dates are a must! (They also really make a board’s calendar look nice.)
Quickly toggle the due date selector while a card is open or when mousing over a card on a list by pressing ‘d’. While you’re there, set up a custom due date reminder to make sure you don’t miss the mark on that deadline.
Of course, with so many cards on your board, you may want to organize them by type or category in a visual way with labels.
Press the ‘l’ key to open the label menu from the card back or while hovering over a card on a list and select the labels you’d like to apply.
But what if you want to move even faster while applying labels?
Here’s a bonus keyboard shortcut for you: Use the number keys 1-9 and 0 to apply labels without having to go through the work to open the menu and select them individually.
Fewer clicks, FTW! Here’s a handy menu to help you out:
|
Key |
Label Color |
| 1 | Green |
| 2 | Yellow |
| 3 | Orange |
| 4 | Red |
| 5 | Purple |
| 6 | Blue |
| 7 | Sky |
| 8 | Lime |
| 9 | Pink |
| 0 | Black |
Alright, here’s one more bonus keyboard shortcut related to labels that I just can’t keep to myself (and won’t count towards the original promise of just seven shortcuts.)
If you name your labels and want to quickly reveal and hide the label names, just press the semicolon key.
Surface The Important Information With Keyboard Shortcuts
Finally, you’ve created all of your cards, assigned tasks to team members, set the due dates, made sure to organize related cards with labels, and now it’s time to get to work.
To quickly remove everyone else from your view press ‘q’ to display only the cards that are assigned to you. Press ‘q’ again to bring everyone else back to the party.
Another way to find what you need is to press ‘f’ to open up the search function in the board’s menu.
Your cursor will automatically be focused in the input field so that you can start searching by term, label, member, or due date. This easy search will help you quickly find what you are looking for across the board.
And there you have it—Seven of my favorite keyboard shortcuts that are sure to boost your Trello productivity.
Of course, I urge everyone to explore the shortcuts menu for themselves and see what works best for you and your workflow. Also, share your favorite Trello tips and tricks on Twitter with the hashtag #trellotips.
Good or bad, we’d love to hear your thoughts. Find us on Twitter (@trello)