How to zoom and pan very quick in Illustrator?

Question

I'm new with Illustrator. Previously I was working with Affinity Designer. I make illustrations and for that I quickly need to zoom in and zoom out and pan also. I can do that very simply in Affinity by tapping the + key (zoom in) or - key (zoom out) and pan with middle click of my Wacom's pen.

In Illustrator, I see I need to press two keys simultaneously to perform the operation (Ctrl+ for zoom in, Ctrl- for zoom out and Space-Single click for panning) I solved the panning by assigning middle button of the pen to Space+Left click. But then I tried to change the zoom shortcuts but Illustrator won't accept anything that is not accompanied with Ctrl.

Is there a quick way around this?

Answer 1

By default...

Spacebar + Click-drag = Pan

Command/Ctrl + Spacebar + Click-drag = Zoom

Assign these commands to the Wacom buttons. I find setting the tablet preferences much better than altering the default shortcuts in AI. Because typically, changing defaults then updating the app means you lose the changes and have to remember them.

You can also still use Command/Ctrl + + and Command/Ctrl + - to zoom in/out, but the spacebar provides fluid zooming rather than incremental, stepped, zooming.

Answer 2

You can completely customise your keyboard shortcuts through Edit > Keyboard Shortcuts (possibly Illustrator > Keyboard Shortcuts for Mac), or press Alt / Option+Control / Command+Shift+K. You can find the 'zoom in' and 'zoom out' functions under 'Menu commands', in the 'View' group. Be warned that in order to assign a single-key shortcut to a menu command, you'll have to choose a function key.

Panning in Illustrator is best done using the space bar. Press and hold it, then drag around to pan. Release the bar to revert to the previous tool.