Google Docs Shortcuts – Change Font Using Keyboard Shortcuts

google docskeyboard shortcuts

Question

I have Google Docs open in the Google Chrome browser on a Mac. Now I select a piece of text and want to change it's font just with keyboard shortcuts — without using the mouse.

Example before font change:

enter image description here

Example after font change to e.g. Courier New:

enter image description here

How do I do that?

What I have tried so far

I've read the Keyboard shortcuts for Google documents page, but haven't found anything useful.

There is the Ctrl+Shift+F keyboard shortcut to collaps the menu bar, which then displays the Search the menus (Alt+/) search box.

Menu before pressing Ctrl+Shift+F:

enter image description here

Menu after pressing Ctrl+Shift+F:

enter image description here

Now this search box is pretty awesome because I can just type "Courier New" and hit Enter. But! Alt+/ is not working! Why not? I can't get the focus into that search box.

At this point, I should perhaps note that the keyboard layout is set to German.

The US keyboard layout looks like this:

enter image description here

The German keyboard layout looks like this:

enter image description here

So the forward slash / is on the 7 key: Shift+7.

But when I press Alt+Shift+7, it opens the Mac OS X Help > Search menu:

enter image description here

I also switched to the US keyboard layout. But pressing Alt+Shift+7 (which is the key left of the right Shift key) produces the same effect.

I've also tried the forward slash key on the number block. No success.

Plus, I've tried Option+/ as documented on the Keyboard shortcuts for Google documents page (the Option key is the Alt key according to Wikipedia). No success either.

enter image description here

Is Mac OS X highjacking the keyboard shortcut?

Versions

  • Google Chrome 31.0.1650.63
  • Mac OS X 10.9.1

Best Answer

Update 28.02.2016

They seem to have updated the possible keyboard shortcuts. With the new keyboard shortcuts, it also works now on my keyboard with the German layout.

For Windows: enter image description here

For OS X: enter image description here

Source: https://support.google.com/docs/answer/179738?hl=en

Original answer

I found a workaround.

  1. Select a piece of text in the document.
  2. Ctrl+Alt+H opens the Help menu.
  3. Arrow down puts the focus in the Search all menus menu.
  4. Type "cour", hit Enter.

enter image description here