As you may noticed, PS does not have a shortcut set for duplicating a Layer or Group. But, that’s OK, cause almost everybody uses Cmd+J when in need to create a copy of the current layer. That’s the thing – it only works for layers. When you need to duplicate a group you have to drag the damn thing to the new icon in the Layers palette or go to the Layer menu… whatever.

Well, let’s assign then the Cmd+J to the “Duplicate Group…” item in the Layers menu. Photoshop can do that – set custom shortcuts. But here’s the the nasty part: now, when you press Cmd+J a very annoying dialog will show up and you have to hit at least Enter to get rid of it.

Is there an easier way? Well, it’s a bit of a tradeoff. Apparently PS can bypass some dialogs by pressing the Option(alt) key. So by assigning Cmd+J to “Duplicate Group…” and by pressing Cmd+Opt+J you can duplicate now layers or groups.

Recap:

  1. Remove the Cmd+J shortcut from Layer via Copy
  2. Assign the Cmd+J to Duplicate Layer (Group)…
  3. Use Cmd+Alt+J to duplicate layer or group

Duplicate group shortcut in Photoshop

If you don’t follow too many people already, I’m also on Twitter.

Photoshop users should check out my new project, PSD Repo – Free quality PSDs available for download.