Comments on: Excel conditional formatting formulas based on another cell

This tutorial explains how to use Excel formulas to format cells and entire rows based on the values you specify or based on another cell's value, and provides a handful of formula examples. Continue reading →

Comments page 47. Total comments: 1726

  1. Hi Svetlana,

    I have a question related to the similar topic. Would you be able to advise if a cell can be formatted/ formulated based on the value of a range of data in a row?

    E.g. A row of data has been conditioned formatted to highlight the highest numerical value as bold blue while the rest which are not the highest numbers are in default black colour.

    In a separate cell, if I were to key in the highest value or other value, can the cell be formatted to show what is exactly in the range of data which was conditioned formatted earlier?

    Thanks a million!

  2. I would like to use conditional formatting for multiple cells based on date. There are pending, completed and "blank" cells. I also need to create a tally based on the updated cells by location (I was thinking i could link the cell to a certain area within the sheet or even create a new sheet. I have six locations and I want to have the table "updated" automatically once a milestone has been completed? How can I do all of this for one sheet?
    Thank you! I need all the help i can get.

  3. I wanted to utilize conditional formatting to highlight cells that are 90 days away from a certain date. Then if it passes that certain date to become red. Can someone please help?

  4. Hi there,
    thank you for the great text. i recently downloaded an spreadsheet from excel built-in template called "Gantt project planner". I was wondering have you seen that file, I couldn't figure out how it used special formatting. If you can't find it. please let me know to explain more. anyway, I copied them in the following,
    Actual =(PeriodInActual*(project!$E14>0))*PeriodInPlan
    ActualBeyond =PeriodInActual*(project!$E15>0)
    PercentComplete =PercentCompleteBeyond*PeriodInPlan
    PercentCompleteBeyond =(project!BY$8=MEDIAN(project!BY$8,project!$E17,project!$E17+project!$F17)*(project!$E17>0))*((project!BY$80)
    PeriodInActual =project!BY$8=MEDIAN(project!BY$8,project!$E19,project!$E19+project!$F19-1)
    PeriodInPlan =project!BY$8=MEDIAN(project!BY$8,project!$C20,project!$C20+project!$D20-1)

    Thank you very much if let me know how these formulas work for conditional formatting.

  5. i used coding in java, Excel - Using formula(String formula = "SUM(Vouchers!E2 : Vouchers!E"+(rec+1)+")";) to reference values on other sheets(Vouchers) get 0 only, i directly apply this formula in excel sheet, got 86123.67, but reference to other sheet got answer of #Value, why this happen?

  6. HI madaam,

    I want to create formula that when I input letter on a cell, ex. L on b5 then
    b6 will have letter v.

  7. Hi Svetlana,
    Great and very informative post.
    In a large range A1:AK100, I need to highlight the first cell (A:A)in a row if ALL cells in the rest of the row are blanks. Please note that all cells contain formulas that either return a value or "".
    Thanks

  8. My query is on conditional formatting with dates.
    I have a s/s which has the following columns:
    1. Date Contract sent out
    2. Date Signed contract returned (blank until it is returned)
    3. 7 days reminder
    4. 14 day reminder
    5. 21 day reminder

    If column 2 is blank, the highlight (I have this part done)
    If column 2 is blank and 7 days have elapsed since date in column 1 then format cell green
    If column 2 is blank and 14 days have elapsed since date in column 1 then format cell orange
    If column 2 is blank and 21 days have elapsed since date in column 1 then format cell red

    Thanks

  9. Hi All,
    I have two cells data as
    A10 : if(a = b)
    B10 : if((a = b) && (b = c))

    I want the cell C10 to be
    c10: if((a = b) && (b = c)), the extra chaecters are to be displayed in Bold RED colour.

    Please help

  10. A B C

    149 86 554

    if less than value is 86 then who can we highlight B in another cell

  11. may i know how to do it

  12. i want to do conditional formatting based on another cell value.
    for ex:

    if cell(A6)= N, the formate of c8:p20 should be defined format,
    like that for different value of a6 the formate of c8:p20(defined formate) should change

  13. Hi,
    i want to know is there any formula to get freez (desire)coloum i.e.

    like if A1=1 than any one able to enter the value or text on G1
    if A1=0 than no one able to enter value or text on G1

    kindly help if you know

    1. Hello Arun,

      I am sorry, I don't know the way to fulfill this task using conditional formatting, a special macro is needed for this.

      1. Hi,
        Thanks a lots for your reply

        is there any reference for same?

        if yes than kindly share with me

  14. hi, i'm looking for a formula to highlight cells in a pivot if cell value is >= 20 and at least 4 consecutive cells. help! thank you.

    1. Hello Shawna,

      Please have look at this article about using conditional formatting in PivotTables:
      https://www.ablebits.com/office-addins-blog/excel-pivot-table-tutorial/

      If you need to highlight cells with the value greater than 20 and if the values of the three preceding cells are greater than 20 as well, then select all the data (they should be in the 4th row or below) and enter this formula:
      =AND($B5>=20,$B4>=20,$B3>=20,$B2>=20)=true

      Where B is the column with your data, B5 is the first cell with the data.

  15. I am trying to highlight duplicate rows only where the duplicated information is on a consecutive row. The duplicated information is a text field -- two letter state abbreviations. Any ideas how to do this with a text field?

  16. I'm trying to setup conditional formatting as follows:

    Say Column A are dates that deliveries were scheduled e.g. 08/27/2014

    I want the conditional format of Column B to show just the scheduled month and year; for example the date in cell A1 (08/27/2014) should appear as Aug-14 in cell B1.

    Can someone provide the type of conditional formatting I should apply to Column B so that no matter the date in Column A, Column B will show that Month and year??

    I creating a macros and this is the final piece to the puzzle. Please and thank you in advance!

    - Lacy

    1. Hi Lacy,

      I think conditional format is not needed for this task. You can enter the formula =A1 in B1, then copy it across the entire column B, and then set the format mmm-yy for column B (Format cells > Number > Custom).

  17. Hi Adam,

    Simply select the range A3:I8 and create the rule with this formula: =$B$3=""

  18. I am having an issue with Conditional Formatting. What I have is A3:I8 and I want to fill in all cells when cell B3 is blank. I have tried everything I can think of and nothing has worked. What would be the best way to accomplish this task?

    1. Hi svetlana! well thanks it was really worked it out.
      Hmmm...well svetlana can u tell me plz frm where i can learn advance Excel and VBA through online ??? so i can check the solutions by my self...??

      Thanks 1nce again..

  19. Is it possible to highlight only duplicate rows that are consecutive in order? Only duplicates on consecutive rows need to be highlighted. The field that is being compared is a text field -- a name.

    Thanks for any direction you can give me.

    1. Hi Sherry,

      You can highlight consecutive dupes by creating a rule in this way:

      - Select the column where you want to highlight duplicates, without the column header.
      - Create a conditional formatting rule using this formula:
      =$A1=$A2

      Where A is the column with your data, $A1 - the column header, and $A2 – the first cell with data.

  20. Hi Excel Gurus,

    I want do following please help me how do I do this.

    I have set of samples taken which about 300000 samples in a column.Now I want to calculate average of every 1000 samples.

    Please help me how to do this calculationin EXCEL.

    --Sameer

    1. Hi svetlana!

      i m having problem in excel regarding below

      assume i have a value which is 10 in cell A1 and 20 cell B1 so i want to calculate these 2 columns or in result i want answer value with Text include by single formula.
      Suppose if i calculate through if condition e.g If(A1>B1,"increased by"A1-B1,"decressed by"A1-B1))

      the answer should be like this ( Decreased by 5 )/(Increased by (value))

      can u plz help me out of this??
      i hope u`ll understand what mean 2 say??

      1. Hi!

        You were almost there : )

        =IF(A1>B1,"Increased by "&(A1-B1),"Decressed by "&(B1-A1))

    2. Hello Sameer,

      Try pasting this formula in any cell of the second row:
      =AVERAGE(INDIRECT("A"&((ROW()-2)*10000+1)&":A"&(ROW()-1)*10000))

      Where A is your column with the data; -2 is the row number with the minus sign. Then copy the formula down to 30 cells.

  21. I have a similar problem that is not listed under your manual. I'm doing a sales analysis from period to period and I need to be able to tell when sales for a certian product either drop or go up by 15% all the sales figures are entered in percents as well.

    1. Hi Bradley,

      I am sorry, I can't make a proper formula without seeing your data. If possible, please send a sample workbook at support@ablebits.com and we'll try to help.

  22. I found the reason my conditional formatting formula didn't work is that I used a lower case letter for the row label rather than upper case.

  23. Can I ask a question – trying to format a pivot table and highlight the last column where the value is under the avg – eg 57709 is below para – please highlight the “4”

    Do you know any other way ? other than manually

    Mark

    57703 21 34 36 31 38 34 33 27 29 44 30 29 29 415
    57709 4 5 2 6 2 2 4 1 5 180 4 215 21.1 4 -17.1
    57712 25 20 21 23 28 32 25 17 30 17 27 24 28 317
    57715 9 8 16 7 15 16 7 11 13 9 113 12 20 256 19.66667 20 0.333333
    57901 1 1 1 2 3 1 3 2 2 1 1 5 2 25

    1. Hi Mark,

      I am sorry, I don't know a way to fulfill this task using conditional formatting formulas.

  24. Not sure if this can be done and I've tried a bunch of different ways to create a rule and keep coming up short. On my X axis I am using names. I know which names need to be in different colors. I cant seem to come up with the proper formula or rule to make this happen.The y axis which relates to $ has nothing to do with what I need the x axis to do so writing a rule to that end wont work. Any suggestions?

    1. Hi Nique,

      Did you try selecting the entire table and creating a rule similar with the below formula?
      =A2="name" (where A2 is the left-most cell of the applied range)

      If this is not the result you are looking for, please send me a sample workbook at support@ablebits.com and include the result you want to get.

  25. Hi Svetlana,

    I am trying to set up conditional formatting rules to evaluate the following excel spreadsheet.

    Actual value column to a Budget column value. Based on the Actual value column if it is 10% or less from budget value color yellow, if greater than 10% color red and if monthly value is equal to budget color green. I have set up 3 rules with Use formula to determine which cell to format, but it not doing what I want it to do?

    Examples:
    Rule 1 B5=C5 format green
    Rule 2 B5>C5*.10 Format Red

    I have tried using $B5 or $B$5 same results,

    any suggestions in accomplishing this task so I can have the color's automatically filled in? Thank you!

    1. Hi Shannon,

      The rule with $B5 should work, assuming that row 5 is the first row in the applied range.

      If it still does not, please verify the following:

      - Make sure you entered the correct column names (B & C)
      - Probably, the Green rule shall be applied when a monthly value is equal or _less than_ a budget: =$B5<=$C5
      - In the Yellow & Red rules, you should multiply by 1.1, not by 0.1. (Red: =$B5>=$C5*1.1)
      - Check if your numbers are formatted as numbers and not as text (they should be aligned to the right, without a green triangle in the top-left corner of the cells)

      If none of the above suggestions work, please send me a sample workbook to support@ablebits.com and I will try to help.

  26. Hi
    I'm trying to setup a conditional formatting with the icon sets and I need some help!
    I've this situation:

    B C D E
    A1 Sell to 20 L
    A2 Buy From 25
    A3 Sell to 30 M
    A4 Buy From 5
    A5 Sell to 15 H
    A6 Buy From 2

    I've setup a conditional formatting check for A1B1 that says if there's an N,L,M,H change to appropriate color (easy!)
    However in the A2B1 (and in every other cells) there's a number that I'd like to have compared to the every other cells that refers to the rows "Buy From" using the icon sets (bars value)
    Is there a way to do this without manually select every other cells and apply the conditional check?
    Also, once I've created the conditional formatting(s) for the column B1, can I copy paste its properties to the other columns by dragging the source column in my worksheet.
    I hope I've explained my problem :-)

    1. Hi Antoine,

      Sure, you can apply your rule to other columns. Go to Conditional Formatting > Manage rules, and change the range in the box under "Applies to".

      As for the icon sets, it is difficult to understand what data you have in the columns without formatting. Please send us your sample workbook to support@ablebits.com and we will try to help.

  27. Hi

    I'm trying to create a conditional formatting rule, but nothing seems to be working, could you help.

    If cell Z3 is equal to or greater than 25 I want cell C3 to be green, if Z3 is between 15 and 24 inclusive I want cell C3 to be orange, if Z3 is equal to or less than 14 I want cell C3 to be red.

    I've managed to get simpler conditional formatting rules to work, but when I've gone to copy for the formula into other rows it wont work.

    Any suggestions please?

    1. Hello Emma,

      Most likely, the problem is in using proper absolute / relative cell references in the formulas. You can find more information about different cell references types in this article: Relative and absolute cell references in conditional formatting rules.

      If you need to compare values in each individual row, select all the rows you want to format and create 3 rules with the following formulas (assuming that row 3 is the first row where the formatting is applied):

      Green: =$Z3>25
      Orange: =AND($Z3>=15, $Z3<=24)
      Red: =$Z3<=14

      In case you want to format all the rows based on the value in cell Z3, use absolute cell references in the above formulas, i.e. $Z$3:
      Green: =$Z$3>25
      etc.

  28. Hi
    I am trying to highlight duplicate data in 1 column only if they data in the next column are also duplicated. How do I do that?
    Thanks

    1. Hi!

      You will need to insert a helper column. Suppose, the original columns are A and B, and column H is the helper column.

      - Type =A2&B2 into the cell H2 and copy the formula down column H.
      - Select columns A & B and create the conditional formatting rule to highlight duplicates with this formula:
      =COUNTIF($H$2:$H$100,$H2)>1

      As an alternative, you can also use our Duplicate Remover add-in (the Color duplicates option) to highlight duplicates. In this case, you won't need a helper column.

  29. Hi

    How to use the function INDEX and MATCH together.Is it better to use than Vlookup?

  30. Sir,
    I have entered in first column category such OPEN,OBC,SC,ST etc then OPEN for 450, OBC for 250, SC for 100 without type the number in infornt of other col. automatically. How it is possible

  31. I want a row to highlight if one cell in that row is not empty, I have chose the row and then in the formula typed =NOT(ISBLANK$I15) and it only highlights the A15 if I put something in I15. this works if I just want to highlight one cell in that row

    1. Hello Patsy,

      You can highlight the entire row if one or several cells in this row are blank using this formula:
      =5-COUNTBLANK($A1:$E1)=1

      Where 5 is the number of columns, and 1 is the min number of empty cells.

      You can also use this simplified formula, where 4 is the difference between the 2 above mentioned numbers:
      =COUNTBLANK($A1:$E1)=4

      1. Thank you Svetlana for answering. I did not make myself clear. Column "I" is blank until a deposit is made and then I put a date there. When I put a date there someone else has to add data to our finance data system so I want it to highlight the entire row when I add something too Column "I" in order for them to see it at a glance. At first I was only highlighting one cell with the formula =NOT(ISBLANK$I15)). The other users felt like it would be easier to following if the complete line was highlighted.

        1. Patsy,

          In this case, simply apply your existing rule to the entire table. Click Conditional Formatting > Manage rules, and change the range in the box under "Applies to".

          Also, make sure all brackets are in place in your real formula, one is missing in the formula you posted here : )

        2. Thanks everyone I found my answer after reading for two hours others problems, and I found someone that had a similar problem and I got it to work. Thanks

  32. Great just to confirm I have noumerous list like
    A B
    1 3
    1
    3 5
    4

    etc. I want conditional formatting as follows
    Format all cells in colum B if the respecting cell is NOT blank and if
    the cell in column B is greater than the cell in column A
    =AND(A1"",B1>A1). the question is how to applying to all the column using respective or absolute values

    1. Hi Stratis,

      You need absolute column references (since both columns are constant) and relative row references, like this:

      If a cell in column A is not empty and if the cell in column B is greater than in column A:

      =AND($A1<>"",$B1>$A1)

      If a cell in column B is not empty and if the cell in column B is greater than in column A:
      =AND($B1<>"",$B1>$A1)

      You can lean more about proper use of absolute and relative cell references in conditional formatting rules in this tutorial:

      https://www.ablebits.com/office-addins-blog/relative-absolute-cell-references-excel-conditional-formatting/

  33. I need a formula I could use that will help me calculate the average of a group cells in one column based on the condition of another column. For example, I want to find the average for data in column D based on data in column E, but the data in column E must only be >750 and <1001. HELP PLEASE!!!!

    1. Hello TJ
      For us to be able to assist you better, please send your sample workbook to alex@ablebits.com.

  34. Svetlana,

    Great blog.

    I would love to find a simple answer to my question and would appreciate your help.

    Two columns A & B

    Column A has a numbers in it such as

    1000-50-50-5060-508150-000000-000-522500- Total
    6000-40-40-4030-409555-000000-998-522500- Total
    6000-40-40-4040-401220-000000-999-522500- Total
    6100-41-41-4110-411001-000000-004-522500- Total
    6300-80-51-8070-807010-000000-000-522500- Total

    Column B has a list of starting numbers such as
    1000-
    2300-
    2600-
    2702-
    2750-
    4001-
    4022-
    6000-
    6067-
    6100-
    6161-
    6200-
    6261-
    6300-
    7100-

    What i would like is for Column B and the cell "1000-" (and other numbers) to be red if there are numbers in column A that start with "1000-" and the other numbers. I only need color in Column B. It seems simple enough but I cannot find a way to do it. I hope that you can give me the solution.

    Thanks.

      1. Hi Ma'am, what is the formula if the quantity of columnA is equal columnB then it highlights the rows if they are equal. ex. 10 rows, 1 row had equal quantity this rows must be fill in color. Thanks

      2. That was exactly what I was looking for. Thank you so much. This will help so much.

  35. Thanks Svetlana, but the questioned I originally asked seems to have been cut short, so I am listing again what I'm trying to achieve.

    I need to have the cells in a specific column colour code according to the rules below:

    - where return date is current date 'red' and lastly
    - when a date is entered in the 'actual return date' cell (different cell)'blue'.

    So assuming the 'return date' cell is B2 and the 'actual return date' cell is F2, can you please advise what the formulas would be for each rule listed above. Additionally, would I need to select 'use a formula to determine which cells to format'?

    Many thanks, Kevin

    1. Again my comment above has been cut short the rules I need to create formulas for, so I will list them again below:

      - where return date is current date 'red' and lastly
      - when a date is entered in the 'actual return date' cell (different cell) 'blue'.

      1. The list of rules keeps getting cut short in each post, so listing them again below:

        1. where return date is current date 'red' 4. when a date is entered in the 'actual return date' cell (different cell) 'blue'.

        1. The comments in my post keep getting cut short and altered. Is there an email address I can send my list of rules I need to create formulas for?

          1. Kevin,

            Please email at alex@ablebits.com. If possible, please include a sample workbook with your data.

            I will try to reply as soon as possible.

  36. Hi
    I have list of weeks like Sunday,Monday,Tuesday,Wednesday,Thursday,Friday,Saturday. And have created a dropdown list for selecting any one. Have tried conditional formating to colour the selected week using lookup formula. But the same is not working even though the formula is correct.
    Weeks are listed A1:A7 and dropdown list at B1, formula I used for conditional formating was =LOOKUP($B$1,$A$1:$A$7)=$B$1
    Kindly help me with correct solution

    1. Hi Mahabaleshwara,

      Do I understand it right that you want to format a cell in the range A1:A7 that contains the same day of the week that is currently selected in the drop-down list in cell B1? If so, then simply select cells A1:A7 and create a rule with this formula:
      =$A1=$B$1

      As I explained in the article, in conditional formatting you write a formula for the top-left cell only and it gets applied to the entire range you've selected when creating a rule.

      If you are looking for something different, please clarify.

  37. I am trying to find a way to incorporate conditional formatting into my behavior system in my school. Every time a student goes a week without having any behavior "marks" they get to move up a level. Is there a way to enter in the number of "marks" a student receives and anytime a zero is entered it changes colors. The hard part is that the second time they have a zero, I would like it to change a different color, as well as the third, fourth, fifth, and sixth time each different colors as well. Keeping in mind that the student may have zero marks one week, and then 4 marks the second week. Any assistance would be greatly appreciated! Thank you in advance for your time.

    1. Hello Alisa,

      Please specify whether you want the color to change for consecutive zeroes only, or they can be mixed with other numbers, e.g. 0, 0, 2, 0, 0.

      If the latter, you can use the following formula:
      =COUNTIF($B2:$F2,"0")=5

      Where $B2:$F2 are the columns where you enter marks during the week, "=5" is the number of zero marks for a certain color.

      1. THANK YOU! This was exactly what I wanted!

        1. One other question for you. I applied this to the first row, but I have 100 students on this spreadsheet. How do I apply this to each row separately?

          Thanks again!

          1. Thank you!

          2. Hi Alisa,

            When creating a rule, just select all the rows to which the rule shall be applied. Then you write the formula for the first row, and Excel will automatically "recalculate" it for other rows.
            You can change the existing rule by clicking Conditional Formatting > Manage Rules > "Applies to" field.

  38. I should specify, I am using the conditional icon sets Green, Yellow and Red.
    Thank you!

  39. Hi,
    I regularly use conditional formatting, but for whatever reason the correct icon colours won't show right away for only a couple of cells.

    But..as soon as I copy and paste the exact same values over itself, it works.

    Or if I open the conditional formatting rules and go to edit it, and click in one of the "value" boxes (not changing any values) and click "Ok" and "Apply" it works.

    Or if I highlight everything and unhide rows (even though no rows are hidden), it works.

    I have checked the parameters a hundred times, and it all appears correct, but it's not showing the right icons until I do either of these three things.

    Help?

    1. Jeremy,

      It is hard to say what can cause the problem without seeing your data. If possible, please send your workbook at support@ablebits.com and we will try to help.

      1. Hi

        What was the problem with this spreadsheet? I am having the same issue. The colour doesn't appear straight away but when i minimise the window and open it back up it appears okay.

        Thanks
        Kirsten

  40. Hi Svetlana,

    I'm a novice at conditional formatting and need your help to create conditional formatting rules to change font colours of a date value in a specific cell dependant on that dates relation to the current date, for a equipment rental tracking spreadsheet. I need to create the following rules: where return date is current day 'red' and lastly when a date is entered actual return date cell (different cell) 'blue'.

    1. Hi Kevin,

      You can use the following formulas to create conditional formatting rules:

      Red: =AND($F2="",$B2>=today())
      Blue: =$F2<>""

      Where $F2 is the first cell in the column "Actual return date"; and $B2 is the first cell in the column "Return date", not including the column headers.
      You can apply the above rules to one or more columns or to the entire table. In the latter case, the whole rows will be highlighted.

  41. In one of my Columns I need to ensure that only 10 numbers are input. I would like the cell to turn yellow if any more or less characters are input. This will help to alleviate me having to track people down for corrections if they know immediately that they have input this number combination with to many or to few characters.

    1. Hello Geoff,

      I think you can create a rule with this formula
      =OR(len($G2)<10,len($G2)>10)

      Where G2 is the first cell in your column, not including headers.

  42. Is there a way to move a whole row to a new sheet based on the contents of one cell? I have a column titled "loan status" and it is either marked with a "C" (closed) or "O" (open). I would like all the closed loans to be moved to Sheet2 once I change the "loan status" to a "C". Thanks.

  43. hi
    I hope you can help with what must be very simple, but I can't get to work and no one else seems to have asked the question anywhere(perhaps because it is so simple LOL)
    I am keeping a record of electricity consumption by month. If for example the figure in B1(Jan 2014)is less than the figure in A1 (Jan 2013) I can conditionally format B1 to go green, but I can't for the life of me get B1 to remain clear if there is no figure in it. I'm guessing that a blank cell is less than any figure in A1? Is there a way to do it?
    Many thanks
    Steve

    1. Hi Steve,

      You are right, the solution is simple, though not obvious at first sight : ) You can achieve the desired result in 2 ways:

      1. Use the following formula for column B:
      =AND($B1<>"",$B1<$A1) The expression $B1<>"" checks whether a cell is not empty, and the AND formula applies the rule only if both conditions are met. 2. In addition to your current rule, create one more rule of the "Format only cells that contain" type > Cell value > Blanks for column B. Alternatively, you can create a rule based on this formula =$B1="", which also applies to blank cells only. Do not set any format for this rule. Finally, make sure this rule is the first in the list, and select the option "Stop if true" next to it.

      1. Brilliant! thank you; option 1 worked perfectly. Thank you so much.
        Steve

  44. Hello-

    So I am using Excel 2010 to keep a list of my exchange servers and all of the DBs at my company. I get a report mailed each morning and I take the values from those reports and import them into excel. From that data I create a bar graph using conditional formatting, but for some reasons the rules will not affect TWO CELLS. Only two. I have the rules setup to affect a range of cells from H6-H37. H10, and H20 simply do not respond to the rules I have configured. I have tried everything...re-writing the rules, I even specifically set the range as those cells individually and the rule still wouldn't affect them. Any ideas?

    Thanks in advance for the help.

    1. Hello,

      Most likely the problem is with the format of those 2 cells. You can try to copy the formal of some other cell where the rules are applied correctly using Excel's Format Painter. Did it help?

      Also you can check the list of rules in the Manage Rules dialog to make sure there are no other rules set for those 2 cells that override your new rules.

    2. Where is this pulling my picture from? That is creepy...

      1. Hello,

        The picture is automatically pulled from gravatar.com (Globally Recognized Avatar).

  45. Thank you. It's for a fantasy football draft, so the 3 data columns are Player Name, Position, and Team.

    I want to base the formatting on Position. So, if Position = QB it shades all 3 cells yellow. If Position = RB it shades them green... and so on.

    1. Thanks for the details, now the task is crystal clear : ) You can achieve the desired result in this way:

      - Select all the rows with data in those 3 columns, not including the column headers.
      - Create conditional formatting rules with the below formulas, assuming that column B is the "Position" column and row 2 is the first row with data:

      Yellow: =$B2="QB"
      Green: =$B2="RB"

  46. Hi,

    I'm trying to format 3 columns of data. Each row of these columns needs to be formatted based on 1 cell in that row. I am trying to format each row given 5 variables for that 1 cell. Is there a way I can do this?

    Thank you.

    1. Hi RW,

      I believe this is possible. However, to be able to suggest a formula, I need to know a bit more about your data. If you can provide an example of what exactly values you have in each of the 3 columns and what condition you want to base the formatting on, I think I will be able to help better.

  47. Hi.. I have conditionally formatted a row of data to highlight the highest cost and lowest cost for a product (each cost in a different column - b,c,d,e).
    How do I copy this format down to 1457 individual rows, without having to paste the format to each row individually?

    1. Hi Jocelyn,

      In conditional formatting rules, cell references are relative to the top-left most cell in the applied range.

      So, simply select all 1457 rows, and create 2 rules with the below formulas (assuming that B2 is the top left-cell in the applied range):
      =MAX($B2:$E2)=B2
      =MIN($B2:$E2)=B2

  48. Hello I am working on a retirement planning spreadsheet. I have keyed in a started working age, and a retirement age of 67. I need help in creating a formula that stops the series at age 67. For example, If I key in age 26, in my table, my series goes to age 71 bc I orginally formatted the table to have a basic start age of 22. I would like to be able to create formula that stops the series at age 67 regardless of the age you start working.

    1. Hi James,

      Try nesting your current formula inside the IF function in this way:
      =IF(A2<=67, YOURFORMULA, "")

      Where A is the collumn with the current age, e.g. 22. Then А46 will have "68" and at this point the formula stops the series.

      If the above approach does not work, please send us your sample workbook with the existing formula at support@ablebits.com, and we will try to figure this out.

  49. Hi
    I have a case.If i type a text "IN" in cell A1, the next cell B1 should be blank.No other values could not be typed in that cell.in same way if a description is already in cell B1 and if I type text "IN" in cell A1 it should get automatically deleted.Pls help me out.

    1. Hi David,

      If column B already has any values, I think conditional formatting won't work. This task requires a macro and you can try to find an example on some Excel-targeted forums like mrexcel.com or excelforum.com. I am sorry for not being able to help you.

  50. Hi Iam trying to enter a formula that returns the following

    In cells in Column J I will be entering employee names against locations in Column K, I then need Column M to return programmed and the whole row to be highlighted in Green,

    However if Column J returns RBS I need column M to return programmed but the row to be highlighted blue

    1. Hi Simon,

      I am sorry, I do not understand what "to return programmed" means and what RBS is. Can you please clarify?

      1. Hi

        What I would like to achieve is:-

        I have 15 employees who work in different teams, I would like to set up a formula that when I type the employees name (ie C Reed) into cell K2 cell N2 is populated with the word Programmed and the entire row is highlighted in green, but if I typed RBS into cell K2 Cell N2 is still popultaed with Programmed but the row is highlighted in blue.

        Thanks for helping

        1. Hi Simon,

          Thanks for the clarifications. Then you can try creating 2 rules with the following formulas:

          Blue: =AND($K2="RBS",$N2="Programmed") This rule should be the first in the list, with the option "Stop if true" checked.

          Green: =AND($K2<>"",$N2="Programmed")

          1. Hi Sorry

            I dont think I made it clear that if I typed RBS or my employees name in to cell K2 I would like the word Programmed to automaticaly appear in Cel N2 and the row to either highlight Blue if Cell K2 contained RBS or Green if an employees name is typed into cell K2

            Thanks for your help

            1. Hi Simon,

              Just enter the below formula to cell N2, and then copy it across the entire column:
              =if(K2<>"","Programmed","")

              This formula will enter the word "Programmed" in column N once you type an employee name in column K in the same row.

              And then, you can create the conditional formatting rules with the formulas I suggested earlier to color the cells in the way you want.

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