I keep reading from people like Robert Scoble that there are all sorts of keyboard shortcuts that make Google Reader one of the fastest for reading lots of RSS feeds. All that I’ve figured out is the space bar, however. Can you share them all for us?
I’m also busy learning how to be maximally efficient in Google Reader so this is a valuable exercise for me too. There’s quite a set of different keyboard shortcuts available in the program, and I dug up the full list by checking Google’s fairly extensive Common Questions document.
Here’s the full list:
j/k | item down/up | selects the next/previous item in the list |
space/shift-space | page down/up | moves the page down/up |
n/p | scan down/up | in list view, selects the next item without opening it |
o | open/close item | in list view, expands or collapses the selected item |
enter | open/close item | in list view, expands or collapses the selected item |
s | toggle star | stars the selected item |
shift-s | toggle share | shares the selected item |
m | mark as read/unread | switches the read state of the selected item |
t | tag an item | opens the tagging field for the selected item |
v | view original | opens the original source for this article in a new window |
shift-a | mark all as read | marks all items in the current view as read |
1 | expanded view | displays the subscription as expanded items |
2 | list view | displays the subscription as a list of headlines |
r | refresh | refreshes the unread counts in the navigation |
shift-n/p | navigation down/up | selects the next/previous subscription or folder in the navigation |
shift-x | navigation expand/collapse | expand or collapse a folder selected in the navigation |
shift-o | navigation open subscription | opens the item currently selected in the navigation |
gh | go to home | goes to the Google Reader homepage |
ga | go to all items | goes to the “All items” view |
gs | go to starred items | goes to the “Starred items” view |
gt | go to tag | allows you to navigate to a tag by entering the tag name |
gu | go to subscription | allows you to navigate to a subscription by entering the subscription name |
u | toggle full screen mode | hides and shows the list of subscriptions |
? | keyboard shortcuts help | displays a quick guide to all of Reader’s shortcuts |
Of these, I have to admit that most don’t seem too useful, and some are confusing in their overlap. For example, while there’s an apparent difference between “j” and “n”, since I always read my feeds in “Expanded” view, they exhibit exactly the same behavior when reading a set of feeds.
I’m most intrigued about sharing items, however, and that’s next on my list, to have a URL where people can look over my shoulder and see what items in my feeds I think are most interesting. That’s the “shift-s” (or “S”) shortcut, btw. I still miss the ability to annotate my shared items a la Bloglines, but perhaps as I dig into the sharing capability I’ll find a similar capability.
Anyway, those are the most critical shortcuts. For the way I use Google Reader to keep up on RSS, I’ll candidly admit that most of ’em are irrelevant (for example, I don’t change views or open or close individual items) and I still read, oh, about 170 feeds on a daily basis. Am I missing key features and capabilities? Perhaps someone who has had more time using Google Reader can comment on this?
Cool, thanks! Very useful
Thank you for this too, got to your site via google search of “google reader shortcut”
Google Reader Keyboard Shortcuts – type “?” to display a handy pop-up window that lists all the shortcuts.