Making Enter Key, Move to Next Cell/Column in DataGridView After Cell Edit

This article explains how we can customize the DataGridView control so that when Enter Key is pressed then cursor (current selection) move to next cell / column after Cell Edit. Level: Intermediate Knowledge Required: DataGridView Description: By default in DataGridView control, when we press Enter Key to stop the editing in Current Cell, cursor moves to next Row and the current row is saved. This style is adopted from Excel, users working on Excel feel no problem with this. But users who worked in older applications do NOT like this type of editing. What they want is when Enter Key is pressed then Cursor should move to next cell / column. In DataGridView control we need to press TAB key to achieve this. Now we are going to customize the DataGridView control, so that when User Stop the Editing in Current Cell by pressing Enter Key then cursor should move in next cell / column. To understand the solution first note the followings, 1) When user presses enter key to stop the Editing, DataGridView CellEndEdit event occurs 2) Then cursor (current selection) moves to next row, on this point SelectionChanged event occurs To achieve this I have used a logic, 1) When CellEndEdit event occurs, I note the Cell which was Edited 2) Then in SelectionChanged event, I first check if this event is occured after the Editing, then I set the cursor (current selection) in the same row but next column of last edited cell Here I have created a customized control which is actually inherited from DataGridView control, and have added this functionality.

Public Class DataGridViewEnterMoveNext
    Inherits DataGridView

    Dim celWasEndEdit As DataGridViewCell
    Private _EnterMoveNext As Boolean = True

    <System.ComponentModel.DefaultValue(True)> _
    Public Property OnEnterKeyMoveNext() As Boolean
        Get
            Return Me._EnterMoveNext
        End Get
        Set(ByVal value As Boolean)
            Me._EnterMoveNext = value
        End Set
    End Property

    Private Sub DataGridView_CellEndEdit(ByVal sender As Object, ByVal e As System.Windows.Forms.DataGridViewCellEventArgs) Handles Me.CellEndEdit
        Me.celWasEndEdit = Me(e.ColumnIndex, e.RowIndex)
    End Sub

    Private Sub DataGridView_SelectionChanged(ByVal sender As Object, ByVal e As System.EventArgs) Handles Me.SelectionChanged
        ' if Enter Move Next should work andalso
        '    mouse button was NOT down
        ' we are checking mouse buttons because if select was changed
        ' by Mouse then we will NOT do our Enter Move Next
        If Me._EnterMoveNext AndAlso MouseButtons = 0 Then
            ' if selection is changed after Cell Editing
            If Me.celWasEndEdit IsNot Nothing AndAlso _
               Me.CurrentCell IsNot Nothing Then
                ' if we are currently in the next line of last edit cell
                If Me.CurrentCell.RowIndex = Me.celWasEndEdit.RowIndex + 1 AndAlso _
                   Me.CurrentCell.ColumnIndex = Me.celWasEndEdit.ColumnIndex Then
                    Dim iColNew As Integer
                    Dim iRowNew As Integer
                    ' if we at the last column
                    If Me.celWasEndEdit.ColumnIndex >= Me.ColumnCount - 1 Then
                        iColNew = 0                         ' move to first column
                        iRowNew = Me.CurrentCell.RowIndex   ' and move to next row
                    Else ' else it means we are NOT at the last column
                        ' move to next column
                        iColNew = Me.celWasEndEdit.ColumnIndex + 1
                        ' but row should remain same
                        iRowNew = Me.celWasEndEdit.RowIndex
                    End If
                    Me.CurrentCell = Me(iColNew, iRowNew)   ' ok set the current column
                End If
            End If
            Me.celWasEndEdit = Nothing                      ' reset the cell end edit
        End If
    End Sub
End Class

Note that I have added a property OnEnterKeyMoveNext if this property is True then our customization will work otherwise NOT. Limitations: As you can see when user presses enter key, the row will be first saved in DataGridView control (ultimately the Source of DataGridView is updated), at this point if one or more columns are NOT allowed to have NULL values then our customization will NOT work properly. Since exception will be thrown and the row will be deleted. To overcome this issue we can set the AllowDBNull = False in our DataTable (which is bind with DataGridView) and use the custom validation as discussed in my previous post. How to add Column/Row Validation Using Typed DataTable Download Source Code: DataGridViewEnterAsTab.Zip See Also: DataGridView control FAQs and Quick Tips Paste Text in DataGridView Control (Bound with BindingSource)