Formatting in Excel seems to be a topic of interest for users at all levels of expertise. In this post I look at three different areas – formatting basics, formatting a report and formatting cells; so there should be something for everyone.
Formatting in Excel – The Basics
A few months ago I had my first attempts at making You Tube videos. One of the topics I covered was formatting in Excel which I called changing how your work looks.
Formatting in Excel – Reports
At the beginning of this year, while learning more about Power Pivot, I came across this interesting blog post on formatting reports in Excel.
http://www.powerpivotpro.com/2012/01/guest-post-15-spreadsheet-formatting-tips/
While some people may have slightly different preferences, there are plenty of good ideas to use. Some of my favourites are:
- Use Center Across Selection rather than merged cells (Tip 3)
- Use a dark grey font colour rather than black (Tip 5).
- Turn off gridlines and row/column headers when you have finished formatting everything else. (Tip 7). Another book that I was reading recently suggested removing the vertical borders in tables and a light grey for horizontal lines. The author also suggested using the Single accounting underline on the Font tab of the Format Cells dialog box (press Ctrl + 1).
Formatting in Excel – Custom Number Formats
I recently discovered that there was a simple custom number format for expressing numbers in thousands by putting a comma at the end of the custom number format. This got me thinking about how many other tips and tricks in regards to custom number formats on the Number tab of the Format Cells dialog box that I was unaware of. I found this interesting Microsoft website on the topic:
Conditional Formatting
What I haven’t covered in this post is conditional formatting. A good place to start is: