When you first pull a keyboard out of the box, you might be a bit surprised by how big it is.
There are so many keys that line its surface that you might not even be sure what they all do.
You may also wonder if your keyboard is missing any keys.
Knowing how many keys your keyboard should have and their functions can make using your keyboard a lot more enjoyable.
Here’s a guide that can help you understand how many keys should be on your keyboard and what they do.
How Many Keys Are On A Keyboard?
There are usually 104 keys on a keyboard.
Some keyboards may exclude the number pad or navigational keys.
If they do exclude them, then the keyboard will have less than 104 keys.
Some keyboards might also have more than 104 keys.
Specialized keyboards for gaming, for example, may have additional keys that can link to certain buttons in a game.
Others can take you directly to your email, home screen, or search bar.
On average, however, most standard keyboards have 104 keys.
What Different Types Of Keys Does A Keyboard Have?
While you might consider all keys on the keyboard to be the same, they actually each have different names or categories.
This makes it easier for manufacturers or sellers to know when something is wrong with a specific area of the keyboard.
Here are the different types of keys on your keyboard.
1. Alphanumeric Keys
Some of the most-used key types on the keyboard are the alphanumeric keys.
These keys make up all the letters and numbers that you use in everyday writing.
They also include the keys that relate to capitalization, spacing, and punctuation.
They are called “alphanumeric” because they include the letters and the numbers that run along the top of the letters.
This type of key arrangement relates to typewriters.
They had the same layout.
When computers came along and replaced typewriters, it made sense to keep the keys all in the same place.
2. Control Keys
These keys help you control certain aspects of the computer.
They’re often used in conjunction with other keys.
For example, you may hit the CTRL and ALT keys to delete something or to bring up the task manager.
The Windows key on PCs is another control key.
Tapping it quickly brings up the Windows menu where you can search for things on your computer.
Another key that belongs to the control key group is ESC.
Hitting this button lets you escape, or exit, from various programs.
3. Function Keys
One row of keys that you may or may not use often is the function keys.
These are the keys that run along the top of the numbers.
They have names like “F1,” “F2,” and so on.
There may sometimes be images below the numbers, but they can also be blank.
These represent keys that, when pressed, perform a certain function.
For example, you may press one that controls the volume of your speakers.
Another might control the brightness of your screen.
They all have different functions which you can also perform through your computer.
However, the keys allow you to control certain things a lot faster since they are just a finger-press away.
Making the function keys work isn’t always straightforward, however.
Sometimes you need to do more than just press the key.
For example, sometimes you have to press and hold the FN key to activate the function keys.
If you were to press a function key without also holding the FN key down, then nothing might happen.
You can usually change that setting on the computer, so you no longer have to press the FN key to make things happen.
However, considering that one of the function keys can be used to put the computer into airplane mode, it’s sometimes a good idea not to change settings.
The last thing you want to do is write a long email or message only to accidentally lose it all by pressing the airplane functional key accidentally.
Function keys provide a shortcut for performing some common actions on the computer.
4. Navigation Keys
There’s a lot more to navigation keys than just moving a screen up and down.
That said, one of their primary uses is moving a page up and down or controlling a character in a video game.
The navigational keys are a cluster of keys on the right side of your keyboard.
They make up the arrows that point upwards, downwards, left, and right.
They also make up the Home, Insert, Page Up, Delete, End, and Page Down keys.
All these keys relate to navigation.
They’re primarily used when editing or writing documents.
For example, you can quickly move up a page by pressing the Page Up key.
You can do this instead of using your mouse to drag or scroll up the page until you arrive at the top of the next page.
The Insert key also allows you to quickly insert another page or character into a document.
Some of the navigation keys have multiple functions.
You can often tell what else they can do by looking at the key.
Some of them have symbols that indicate the other functions that they have.
As such, the navigation keys are often forgotten about, but they can make viewing documents or writing them a bit faster.
5. Numeric Keypad
The final part of a keyboard is the numeric keypad.
This is a collection of keys at the far right of your keyboard.
Their main purpose is to make typing numbers and doing basic math faster and easier.
You can quickly type the numbers that you need to add or subtract and find out the sum.
You can also divide and multiply with the keypad.
The keypad isn’t always on, however.
You sometimes need to turn it on by pressing the Num Lock key or pressing something else on your computer.
Some of the navigational keys are also on the number keypad.
You can use it instead of the navigational keys if you want to page up or down.
The numerical keypad keys let you perform mathematical equations fast and easily.
6. Indicator Lights
As a bonus, another important part of your keyboard are the indicator lights.
You should have three.
When you press a lock button on your keyboard, the light on the indicator section will turn on.
This acts as a reminder that you have a certain lock on.
In most cases, the lock you’ll use the most is your Caps Lock.
When this key gets pressed, it turns on Caps Lock.
As its name might suggest, it makes all the letter keys that you press become capitalized.
It’s helpful if you want to write someone an angry message or type aggressively.
Otherwise, Caps Lock is usually best kept off.
To turn it off, you simply press the Caps Lock key again.
The indicator light should also turn off.
You can also override Caps Lock by holding down shift while you’re typing.
This will force the capital letters to become lowercase once more.
However, it does require you to hold down the Shift key the whole time.
What Are Some Keyboard Shortcuts?
While you can always click and press keys to perform certain functions, some shortcuts can make the process a bit faster.
By knowing which combination of keys to press, you can speed up certain tasks to make your life a bit easier.
Here are some popular keyboard shortcuts that you should consider committing to memory.
1. Undo
Perhaps one of the most popular shortcuts in the PC world is the Undo shortcut.
You’ve probably had a moment where you typed something that you didn’t mean to.
You may have copied and pasted something somewhere that it wasn’t supposed to go.
Whenever you do something by accident, you often must highlight the mistake and delete it.
That can be difficult to do, especially if the mistake was graphical and not simple text.
Luckily, the keyboard gives you a quick way to get rid of your mistake.
It’s called the Undo shortcut.
By holding the CTRL key and pressing the Z key, you can quickly undo the function that you just performed.
If you accidentally pasted something, then a quick press of CTRL and Z can make it disappear.
If you were creating digital art and your brush went a little crazy, a quick press of CTRL and Z makes it go away.
It’s a powerful function that can make your life a lot easier.
Keep in mind that not every program supports an Undo function.
Those that do, however, make it easy to undo any mistakes you’ve made.
2. Cut, Copy, And Paste
One of the ways that your efficiency can come to a quick halt is if you have to retype something that you’re copying from somewhere else.
For example, if you’re trying to show a friend a part of an article, you may choose to type it all out word-for-word.
A much easier way to do that is to master the shortcut for copying or cutting and pasting.
It’s worth distinguishing between what copy and cut do.
To cut something is to take a line of text and remove it entirely from its original source.
You can’t do this on websites, but you can do it on documents that you’re working on.
This is ideal if you want to completely transfer the information from one place to another.
It isn’t ideal if you need that information to also stay in its original location.
That’s because cutting the text removes it from its original location.
Copying is a bit different in that it copies the text without getting rid of it.
You can also think of copying as duplicating.
It’s basically duplicating the text that you selected.
Both copy and cut functions allow you to paste the information elsewhere.
When you paste it, you’re transferring the information from its former location to the new location.
Everything you cut or copied gets transferred over unless the program you’re pasting into has a character limit.
You may run into trouble if that’s the case.
While most programs offer a cut, copy, and paste function, it’s a lot faster if you know the keyboard shortcuts for them.
To cut something, the shortcut is to hold down the CTRL key and press the X key.
First, you’ll need to highlight the text or URL that you want to paste elsewhere.
To copy something, the shortcut is to hold down the CTRL key and press the C key.
Again, you’ll want to select the text or URL that you want to copy.
Finally, the shortcut to paste something is to hold CTRL and press the V key.
This will paste all the information that you copied or cut.
These shortcuts make transferring information or links extremely quick and easy.
3. Find
It may surprise you how useful the Find function can be.
People tend to underutilize it.
The Find function allows your computer to quickly scan text for the keyword that you type into it.
For example, if you’re looking for a specific passage within a large document, then you might use the Find key to get to that passage faster.
All you need to do is type in what you’re looking for, and the page will highlight all the keywords that match your search.
As an example, if you’re studying a text for a tabletop game, then you might want to know where it mentions healing.
You can press the Find function on your computer, then type in the word “healing.”
All the words that match your criteria will be highlighted in the text.
You can also quickly jump between words.
While computers typically have the Find function built into them, it can be annoying to find.
Using the keyboard shortcut is a lot faster.
To use the shortcut, press and hold the CTRL key and then press the F key.
The Find function will pop up.
All you need to do from there is type in the word or words that you’re looking for.
It will then run through the text for you and bring up all the instances that match what you typed.
Using the Find shortcut is ideal for quickly scanning information to find exactly what you need.
4. Select All
A final keyboard shortcut that is extremely helpful is to select everything.
If you have a ton of files that you want to move from one folder to another, for example, it can take a long time to move each file individually.
The same goes for moving music files elsewhere.
A much faster way is to select everything and move it all at one time.
While this might make the process take longer, it also means you don’t have to individually move each file yourself.
Instead, you can go get some water or take a bathroom break while your computer is moving all the files for you.
Your computer also gives you a function to select all, but this can sometimes become burdensome.
It’s a lot easier to simply press a few buttons on your keyboard.
To use the Select All keyboard shortcut, you just need to hold the CTRL key and press the A key.
First, place your mouse near the text you wish to select and everything should become highlighted.
Then you can simply right-click or drag the files and perform the action that you need to perform.
The Select All function can be a great way to make certain tasks more efficient.
Conclusion
Keyboards can be used for far more than just typing search terms on the Internet.
You can use them to quickly crunch numbers or perform specific functions for you.
Knowing keyboard shortcuts makes performing those functions even easier.
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