INDEX

 Excel conditional formatting basics

 How to create Excel conditional formatting rules
 Highlight Cells Rules
 Top/Bottom Rules
 Data Bars
 Color Scales
 Icon Sets
 Format only values that are above or below average
 Format only unique or duplicate values
 Use a formula to determine which cells to format
 How to copy conditional formatting in Excel
 How to delete conditional formatting rules
 Conditional formatting rule precedence
 Questions
 Excel conditional
formatting basics
 Excel conditional formatting is a really powerful feature when it
comes to applying different formats to data that meets certain
conditions.
 It can help you to highlight the most important information in
your spreadsheets and identify variances of cells' values with a
quick glance.
 At the same time, Conditional Formatting is often deemed as
one of the most complicated and unclear Excel functions,
especially by beginners.
 Excel conditional
formatting basics
 The same as usual cell formats, you use conditional formatting in
Excel to format your data in different ways by changing cells' fill
color, font color and border styles.
 The difference is that conditional formatting is more flexible, it
allows you to format only the data that meets certain criteria, or
conditions.
 You can apply conditional formatting to one or several cells,
rows, columns or the entire table based on the cell contents or
based on another cell's value. You do this by creating rules
(conditions) where you define when and how the selected cells
should be formatted.
 How to create Excel
conditional formatting rules

 Conditional Formatting resides on the Home tab > Styles group.

 Conditional formatting rules in Excel define 2 key things:

I. What cells the conditional formatting should be applied to, and
II. Which conditions should be met.
 Conditional formatting -
Highlight Cells Rules
 The formatting scenarios under the Highlight Cells Rules category, shown in this
figure, allow you to highlight those cells whose values meet a specific condition.
 The thing to remember about these scenarios is that they work very much like an
IF … THEN … ELSE statement. That is to say, if the condition is met, the cell is
formatted and if the condition is not met, the cell remains untouched.
 Conditional formatting -
Highlight Cells Rules (Con…)
 If none of the ready-to-use formatting rules is suitable for your needs, you can
create a new one from scratch. click More Rules...
 Conditional formatting -
Top/Bottom Rules
The formatting scenarios under the Top/Bottom Rules category, allow you to
highlight those cells whose values meet a given threshold.
 Conditional formatting -
Top/Bottom Rules (Con…)
 If none of the ready-to-use formatting rules is suitable for your needs, you can
create a new one from scratch. click More Rules...
 Conditional formatting -Data
Bars
You use conditional formatting Data Bars to represent data graphically inside a
cell. The longest bar represents the highest value and, as you can easily guess,
shorter bars represent smaller values. Data bars can help you spot large and small
numbers in your spreadsheets, for example top-selling and bottom-selling products
in your sales reports.
 Conditional formatting -Data
Bars (Con…)
 If you want to apply your own data bar
style, click More Rules... as usual to bring
up the Edit Formatting Rule window, where
you choose the desired options:
 Place a check in the Show Bar
Only checkbox to hide the cells' values
and display the colored bars only.
 To select
the Minimum and Maximum data types,
click the little black arrow next to the
corresponding box. While
the Automatic type works fine in most
cases, you can also choose some other
data type such as percent, number,
formula, etc.
 Experiment with Fill color, Border and Bar
direction and click OK when you are
happy with theData Bar Preview.
 Conditional formatting -Color
Scales
Using conditional formatting Color Scales, you can format your cells with two or
three color gradients, where different color shades represent different cell values.
 Conditional formatting -Color
Scales (Con..)
 But if you really want to
impress someone and have
the time, try out the More
Rules...

 option again and play with

the colors a bit. First off,
you choose either a 2-Color
or 3-Color scale, then
select your own colors and
assign them to the
minimum, maximum, and
midpoint values.
 Conditional formatting -Icon
Sets
Excel conditional formatting icon sets will help you visually represent your data
with arrows, shapes, check marks, flags, rating starts and other objects.
 Conditional formatting -Icon
Sets (Con…)
In the screenshot above, you can see a table with a green arrows representing
the lowest variances and red arrows higher variances. We cannot say that
Excel has interpreted the data in the way We wanted, so let's customize the
icon set a bit. To do this, click More Rules...
 Conditional formatting -Icon
Sets (Con…)

 To change the order of icons, click the Reverse Icon Order button.

 To hide the cells' values, select the Show Icon Only check box.

 To assign icons based on a cell's value instead of specifying a number or

percent, type the cell's address in the Value box
 Conditional formatting –New
Rule
Click Conditional formatting > New Rule…

Format only values that are above or below average

 Conditional formatting –New
Rule (Con…)
Format only unique or duplicate values
 Conditional formatting –New
Rule (Con…)
Use a formula to determine which cells to format
 How to copy conditional
formatting in Excel
 If you want to apply the conditional format you have created earlier to other
data on your worksheet, you won't need to create the rule from scratch.
Simply use Format Painter to copy the existing conditional formatting to the
new data set.
1. Click any cell with the conditional formatting you want to copy.
2. Click Home > Format Painter. This will change the mouse pointer to a
paintbrush.

3. To paste the conditional formatting, click on the first cell and drag the
paintbrush down to the last cell in the range you want to format.
 How to delete conditional
formatting rules
 To delete a rule, you
can either:
1. Open the Conditional
Manager Rules
Manager (as you
remember, you open
it via Conditional
Formatting > Manage
Rules...), select the
rule and click the
Delete Rule button.

2. Select the range of

cells, click
Conditional
Formatting > Clear
Rules and choose
one of the available
options.
 Conditional formatting rule
precedence
 What happens when more than one conditional formatting rule evaluates to true
For a range of cells, you can have more than one conditional formatting rule that
evaluates to true. Either the rules don't conflict or they conflict:
 When rules don't conflict For example, if one rule formats a cell with a bold
font and another rule formats the same cell with a red color, the cell is formatted
with both a bold font and a red color. Because there is no conflict between the
two formats, both rules are applied.
 When rules conflict For example, one rule sets a cell font color to red and
another rule sets a cell font color to green. Because the two rules are in conflict,
only one can apply. The rule that is applied is the one that is higher in
precedence.
 A rule higher in the list has greater precedence than a rule lower in the list. By
default, new rules are always added to the top of the list and therefore have a
higher precedence, but you can change the order of precedence by using the
Move Up and Move Down arrows in the dialog box.
Questions