What if formatting in excel

Imagine that you entered the formula in the upper-left cell of the selection, and then copied the formula across the entire selection. If you struggle with this, see the section on Dummy Formulas below.

Below are examples of custom formulas you can use to apply conditional formatting. Some of these examples can be created using Excel's built-in presets for highlighting cells, but custom formulas can go far beyond presets, as you can see below.

To highlight rows that represent orders from Texas abbreviated TX , use a formula that locks the reference to column F:. For more details, see this article: Highlight rows with conditional formatting. Video: How to highlight rows with conditional formatting. To highlight dates occurring in the next 30 days, we need a formula that 1 makes sure dates are in the future and 2 makes sure dates are 30 days or less from today. The NOW function returns the current date and time.

For details about how this formula, works, see this article: Highlight dates in the next N days. Given two columns that contain similar information, you can use conditional formatting to spot subtle differences. The formula used to trigger the formatting below is:. This formula simply checks each value in List A against values in the named range "list" D5:D Although Excel has presets for "top values", this example shows how to do the same thing with a formula, and how formulas can be more flexible.

By using a formula, we can make the worksheet interactive — when the value in F2 is updated, the rule instantly responds and highlights new values. If cell a1 is less than 0. Can you have multiple conditions on multiple cells for formatting on one cell?? What if Column C had numbers they are weekly grades , and you wanted to show a trend arrows comparing progress of each student from the current week column c from the previous week column b.

Patrick, most font sets have arrows in them. In the character map, you can copy characters and paste them into the formula. My arrows got converted to question marks, but where you see the question marks in the formula, you would copy and paste the up and down arrows from the character map.

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This means that every time you visit this website you will need to enable or disable cookies again. Toggle navigation. How to use conditional formatting with IF function in Microsoft Excel.

Comments TP Lim April 3, at am. Manish Singh April 12, at am. TP Lim April 3, at am. Yet another anonymous victim of the Microsoft Deproductivity Department October 5, at pm. I'm not subscribed to the thread so anyone else is welcome to chirp in but I won't see it.

Di February 13, at pm. MegM November 28, at pm. In this tutorial, we will continue exploring the fascinating world of Excel Conditional Formatting. If you do not feel very comfortable in this area, you may want to look through the previous article first to revive the basics - How to use conditional formatting in Excel. Today are going to dwell on how to use Excel formulas to format individual cells and entire rows based on the values you specify or based on another cell's value.

This is often considered advanced aerobatics of Excel conditional formatting and once mastered, it will help you push the formats in your spreadsheets far beyond their common uses. Excel's pre-defined conditional formatting rules are mainly purposed to format cells based on their own values or the values you specify.

If you want to apply conditional formatting based on another cell or format the entire row based on a single cell's value, then you will need to use Excel formulas. So, let's see how you can make a rule using a formula and after that I will provide a number of formula examples for different tasks. To set up a conditional formatting rule based on a formula in Excel , Excel , Excel and Excel , carry out these steps:.

Now that you know how to create and apply Excel conditional formatting based on another cell, let's move on and see how to use various Excel formulas in practice:. However, these rules do not work if you want to conditionally format certain columns or entire rows based on a cell's value in another column.

In this case, you use analogous formulas:. The screenshot below shows an example of the Greater than formula that highlights product names in column A if the number of items in stock column C is greater than 0.

In a similar fashion, you can create a conditional formatting rule to compare values of two cells. For example:. As you can see in the screenshot below, these formulas work for text values as well as for numbers. Please pay attention that the formula works with text values as well as with numbers. These are the basic conditional formatting formulas you use in Excel. Now let's consider a bit more complex but far more interesting examples.

I think everyone knows how to format empty and not empty cells in Excel - you simply create a new rule of the " Format only cells that contain" type and choose either Blanks or No Blanks.

But what if you want to format cells in a certain column if a corresponding cell in another column is empty or not empty?

In this case, you will need to utilize Excel formulas again:. And here is an example of how you can use the above formulas in practice. These 2 columns have a value only if a sale has been made and the item delivered. So, you want the entire row to turn orange when you've made a sale; and when an item is delivered, a corresponding row should turn green. To achieve this, you need to create 2 conditional formatting rules with the following formulas:. How can I get this conditional formatting to stay in place?

I need help with conditional formatting, I cannot seem to make the rules work and apply to the whole sheet. By continuing to use this website, you agree to their use. Connect anytime to free, instant, live Expert help by installing the Chrome extension Add Excelchat to Chrome. Quick Excel Help. Get instant live expert help with Excel or Google Sheets.

Post your problem and you'll get expert help in seconds Your message must be at least 40 characters. Our professional experts are available now. Your privacy is guaranteed. Connect to an Expert. Another blog reader asked this question today on Excelchat:. I need conditional formatting based off a range of cells.

Getting error: This type of reference cannot be used in a Conditional Formatting formula. An Excelchat Expert solved this problem in 20 mins! I need the conditional formatting formula to adjust to each row the cell is on.

I used the format painter but this copies the same formula to all cells. Need it to adjust to every row.