A cell address formatted as an absolute reference doesn't change when you copy and paste it to other parts of your worksheet, enabling you to easily apply it to the entire column.

Q: My partner says there’s an F4 shortcut to creating absolute cell references in Excel formulas, but for the life of me I can’t make it work. What am I doing wrong? A: Your partner is right, but ...

Microsoft Excel updates cell references when you copy an expression. Here are a couple of workarounds for those rare occasions when you don't want to change the cell references.

You can do that by using an absolute reference to the cell that contains the constant. 1. Set up a column of numbers you want to multiply, and then put the constant in another cell. 2.