Codes for excel formatting

This tutorial about cell format types in Excel is an essential part of your learning of Excel and will definitely do a lot of good to you in your future use of this software, as a lot of tasks in Excel sheets are based on cells format, as well as several errors are due to a bad implementation of it.

A good comprehension of the cell format types will build your knowledge on a solid basis to master Excel basics and will considerably save you time and effort when any related issue occurs.

A- Introduction

Excel software formats the cells depending on what type of information they contain.

To update the format of the highlighted cell, go to the “Home” tab of the ribbon and click, in the “Number” group of commands on the “Number Format” drop-down list.

The drop-down list allows the selection to be changed.

Cell formatting options in the “Number Format” drop-down list are:

• General
• Number
• Currency
• Accounting
• Short Date
• Long Date
• Time
• Percentage
• Fraction
• Scientific
• Text
• And the “More Number Formats” option.

Clicking the “More Number Formats” option brings up additional options for formatting cells, including the ability to do special and custom formatting options.

These options are discussed in detail in the below sections.

Cell format types in Excel are: General, Number, Currency, Accounting, Date, Time, Percentage, Fraction, Scientific, Text, Special (Zip Code, Zip Code + 4, Phone Number, Social Security Number), and Custom. You can get them from the “Number Format” drop-down list in the “Home” tab, or from the launcher arrow below it.

I will detail each one of them in the following sections:

1- General format

By default, cells are formatted as “General”, which could store any type of information. The General format means that no specific format is applied to the selected cell.

When information is typed into a cell, the cell format may change automatically. For example, if I enter “4/4/19” into a cell and press enter, then highlight the cell to view details about it, the cell format will be listed as “Date” instead of “General”.

Similarly, we can update a cell’s format before or after entering data to adjust the way the data appears. Changing the format of a cell to “Currency” will make it so information entered is displayed as a dollar amount.

Typing a number into this cell and pressing enter will not just show that number, but will instead format it accordingly.

Before pressing enter, Excel shows the value which was typed: “4”.

After pressing enter, the value is updated based on the formatting type selected.

Don’t let the format type showed in the illustration at the drop-down list confusing you; it is reflecting the cell below (i.e. E4), since we validated by an Enter.

2- Number format

Cells formatted as numbers behave differently than general formatted cells. By default, when a number is entered, or when a cell is formatted as a number already, the alignment of the information within the cell will be on the right instead of on the left. This makes it easier to read a list of numbers such as the below.

Note in the above screenshot that since we didn’t choose the “Number” format for our cells, they still have a “General” one. They are numbers for Excel (meaning, we can do calculations on them), but they didn’t have yet the number format and its formatting aspects:

You can set the formatting options for Excel numbers in the “Format Cells” dialog box.

To do that, select the cell or the range of cells you want to set the formatting options for their numbers, and go to the “Home” tab of the ribbon, then in the “Number” group of commands, click on the launcher of the dialog box (the arrow on the right-down side of the group).

Excel opens the “Format Cells” dialog box in its “Number” tab. Click in the “Category” pane on “Number”.

• In this dialog box, you can decide how many decimal places to display by updating options in the “Decimal places” field.

Note that this feature is also available in the “Home” tab of the ribbon where you can go to the “Number” group of commands and click the Increase Decimal or Decrease Decimal buttons.

Here is the result of consecutive increasing of decimal places on our example of data (1 decimal; 2 decimals; and 3 decimals):

• You can also decide if commas should be shown in the display as a thousand separator, by updating the “Use 1000 Separator (,)” option in the “Format Cells” dialog box.

This feature is also available in the “Home” tab of the ribbon by clicking the “Comma Style” button  in the “Number” group of commands.

Note that using the Comma Style button will automatically set the format to Accounting.

• Another option from the Format Cells dialog box is to decide how negative numbers should display by using the “Negative numbers” field.

There are four options for displaying negative
numbers.

1. Display
   negative numbers with a negative sign before the number.
2. Display
   negative numbers in red.
3. Display
   negative numbers in parentheses.
4. Display
   negative numbers in red and in parentheses.

3- Currency format

Cells formatted as currency have a currency symbol such as a dollar sign $ immediately to the left of the number in the cell, and contain two numbers after the decimal by default.

The alignment of numbers in currency formatted cells will be on the right for readability.

Currency formatting options are similar to
number formatting options, apart from the currency symbol display.

• As with regular number formatting, you can decide, in the “Format Cells” dialog box, how many decimal places to display by updating the field “Decimal places”.

You can also find this feature in the “Home” tab of the ribbon, by going to the “Number” group of commands and clicking the Increase Decimal or Decrease Decimal .

• You can also decide what currency symbol should be shown in the display by updating the “Symbol” field in the “Format Cells” dialog box.

• As with regular number formatting, you can also decide how negative numbers should display by updating the “Negative numbers” field in the “Format Cells” dialog box.

There are four
options for displaying negative numbers.

1. Display
   negative numbers with a negative sign before the number.
2. Display
   negative numbers in red.
3. Display
   negative numbers in parentheses.
4. Display
   negative numbers in red and in parentheses.

4- Accounting format

Like with the currency format, cells formatted as accounting have a currency symbol such as a dollar sign $; however, this symbol is to the far left of the cell, while the alignment of numbers in the cell is on the right. Accounting numbers contain two numbers after the decimal by default.

Clicking the “Accounting Number Format” button in the “Number” group of commands of the “Home” tab, will quickly format a cell or cells as Accounting.

The down arrow to the right of the Accounting Number Format button allows selection between common symbols used for accounting, including English (dollar sign), English (pound), Euro, Chinese, and French symbols.

Accounting formatting options in the “Format Cells” dialog box (“Home” tab of the ribbon, in the “Number” group of commands, click on the launcher of the “Number Format” dialog box), are similar to number and currency formatting options.

• You can decide how many decimal places to display by updating its option in the “Format Cells” dialog box.

As mentioned before in this tutorial, this feature is also available directly in the “Home” tab of the ribbon by clicking the Increase Decimal or Decrease Decimal buttons in the “Number” group of commands.

• You can also decide in the “Format Cells” dialog box, what currency symbol should be shown in the display by using the “Symbol” drop-down list.
  This dropdown gives a much broader list of options than the “Accounting Number Format” option in the “Home” tab of the ribbon.

Note that with the Accounting formatting option, negative numbers display in parentheses by default. There are not options to change this.

5- Date format

There are options for “Short Date” and “Long Date” in the “Number Format” dropdown list of the “Home” tab.

Short date shows the date with slashes separating month, day, and year. The order of the month and day may vary depending on your computer’s location settings.

Long date shows the date with the day of the week, month, day, and year separated by commas.

More options for formatting dates are available in the “Format Cells” dialog box (accessible by clicking in the “Number Format” dropdown list of the “Home” tab and choosing the “More Number Formats” option at the bottom).

• You can choose from a long list of available date formats.

• You can update the location settings used for formatting the date. This will alter the list of format options in the above list and will adjust the display and potentially the order of the elements (day, month, year) within the date.
  Note the below example when we switch from English (United States) format to English (United Kingdom) format.

6- Time format

Cells formatted as time display the time of
day. The default time display is based on your computer’s location settings.

Time formatting options are available in the “Format Cells” dialog box (accessible by choosing the “More Number Formats” option at the bottom of the “Number Format” dropdown list in the “Home” tab of the ribbon).

• You can choose from a long list of available time formats.

• You can update the location settings used for formatting the time. This will alter the list of format options in the above list and will adjust the display.

7- Percentage format

Cells formatted as percentage display a percent sign to the right of the number. You can change the format of a cell to a percentage using the “Number Format” dropdown list, or by clicking the “Percent Style” button . Both options are accessible from the “Home” tab of the ribbon, in the “Number” group of commands.

Note that updating a number to a percentage
will expect that the number already contains the decimal. For example:

A cell containing the value 0.08, as a percentage, will show 8%.

A cell containing the value 8, as a percentage, will show 800%.

Percentage formatting options are available in the “Format Cells” dialog box, accessible by clicking on “More Number Formats” of the “Number Format” dropdown list in the “Home” tab of the ribbon.

8- Fraction format

Cells formatted as a fraction display with a slash
symbol separating the numerator and denominator.

Fraction formatting options are available in the “Format Cells” dialog box, accessible by clicking in the “Home” tab of the ribbon, on “More Number Formats” of the “Number Format” dropdown list.

• Note that
  when selecting the format to use for a fraction, Excel will round to the
  nearest fraction where the formatting criteria can be met.

As an example, if the
formatting option selected is “Up to one digit”, entering a fraction with two
digits will cause rounding to occur. For example, with the setting of “Up to
one digit”,

If we enter a value of 7/16, the value displayed will be 4/9, as converting to 9ths was the option with only one digit which required the least amount of rounding.

For another example, if the formatting option selected is “As quarters”, entering a fraction that cannot be expressed in quarters (divisible by four) will also cause rounding to occur.

If we enter a value of 5/8, the value displayed will be 3/4. Excel rounded up to 6/8, or 3/4, which was the closest option divisible by four.

• Also note
  that for the formatting options with “Up to x digits”, Excel will always round
  down to the lowest exact equivalent fraction when possible.

For example, if we enter a value of 2/4 with one of these formatting options active, the value displayed will be 1/2, as this is the mathematical equivalent. This behavior will not take place for formatting options “As…”, since these specifically determine what the denominator should be.

• Fractions listed as more than a whole (meaning the numerator is a higher number than the denominator), such as 7/4 will automatically be adjusted into a whole number and a fraction 13/4, where the fraction follows the formatting rules selected.

9- Scientific format

Scientific format, otherwise known as
Exponential Notation, allows very large and small numbers to be accurately
represented within a cell, even when the size of the cell cannot accommodate
the size of the numbers.

The way exponential notation works is to theoretically place a decimal in a spot that would make the number shorter, then describe where to move that decimal to return to the original number.

Examples with large numbers, where the decimal is moved to the left:

For the number 300 to be expressed in
exponential notation, Excel moves the decimal from after the whole number
300.00 to between the 3 and the 00. This is typed out as E+02 since the decimal
was moved two places to the left. The other examples are similar, where the
decimal was moved 6 and 12 places to the left.

Examples with small numbers, where the decimal is moved to the right:

For the number 0.2 to be expressed in
exponential notation, Excel moves the decimal to create a whole number 2. This
is typed out as E-01 since the decimal was moved one place to the right. The
other examples are similar, where the decimal was moved 4 and 10 places to the
right.

Scientific formatting options are listed in the “Format Cells” dialog box, accessible by going to the “Home” tab of the ribbon, and clicking the “More Number Formats” option of the “Number Format” dropdown list.

The only option available is to alter the
number of decimal places shown in the number prior to the scientific notation.

For example, for the value 11.43 formatted with the scientific format, if we change the Decimal places from 2 to 1, the display will change as follows.

Two decimals:  

One decimal:    

10- Text format

Cells can be formatted as Text through the
“Number Format” dropdown list, in the “Number” group of commands of the “Home”
tab.

Using the Text format in Excel allows values to be entered as they are, without Excel changing them per the above formatting rules.

In general, when entering a text in a cell, you won’t need to set its type to “Text”, as the default format type “General” is sufficient in most cases.

This may be useful when you want to display numbers with leading zeros, want to have spaces before or after numbers or letters, or when you want to display symbols that Excel normally uses for formulas.

Below are examples of some fields formatted as Text.

Note that when a number is formatted as Text, Excel will display a symbol showing that there could be a possible error .

Clicking the cell, then clicking the pop-up icon will show what the error may be and offer suggestions for resolution.

11- Special format

Special format offers four options in the “Format Cells” dialog box, accessible by going to the “Home” tab of the ribbon, and clicking the launcher arrow in the “Number” group of commands.

• Zip Code

When less than five numbers are entered in Zip
Code format, leading zeros will be added to bring the total to five numbers.

When more than five numbers are entered in Zip Code format, all numbers will be displayed, even though this does not meet the format criteria.

• Zip Code + 4

Zip Code + 4 format automatically creates a
dash symbol – before the last four numbers in the zip code.

When less than nine numbers are entered in Zip
Code + 4 format, leading zeros will be added to bring the total to nine
numbers.

When more than nine numbers are entered in Zip Code + 4 format, extra numbers are displayed prior to the dash symbol –.

• Phone Number

Phone Number format automatically creates a
dash –
before the last four numbers in the phone number. This format also adds
parentheses ( ) around the area code when an area code is entered.

When less than the expected number of digits
are entered in Phone Number format, only the entered digits will be displayed,
starting from the end of the phone number, as shown on the third and fourth
lines, below.

When more than the expected number of digits
are entered in Phone Number format, extra numbers are displayed within the area
code parentheses.

Note that Phone Number format in Excel does not handle the number 1 before an area code. This entry would be treated like any other extra number.

• Social Security Number

Social Security Number format automatically
creates a dash – before the last four numbers in the social security number
and a dash before the last six numbers in the social security number.

When less than nine numbers are entered in
Social Security Number format, leading zeros will be added to bring the total
to nine numbers.

When more than nine numbers are entered in Social Security Number format, extra numbers are displayed prior to the first dash –.

12- Custom format

Custom formats can be used or added through the
“Format Cells” dialog box, accessible from the “Number” group of commands in
the “Home” tab of the ribbon by clicking the “Number Format” launcher arrow.

This can be useful if the above formatting options do not work for your needs. Custom number formats can be created or updated by typing into the “Type” field of the “Format Cells” dialog box.

When creating a new custom format, be sure to use an existing custom format that you are okay with changing.

Custom number formats are separated, at
maximum, into four parts separated by semicolons ; .

• Part 1: How
  to handle positive number values
• Part 2: How
  to handle negative number values
• Part 3: How
  to handle zero number values
• Part 4: How
  to handle text values

Note that if fewer parts are included in the custom format coding, Excel will determine how best to merge the above options: As an example, if two parts are listed, positive and zero values will be grouped.

Note that Excel may update the formatting of some fields to Custom automatically depending on what actions are taken on the field.

C- Common issues caused by wrong cell format types in Excel

1- Common issues due to wrong cell format types in Excel

The most common problems you may encounter with a wrong cell format type in Excel are of 3 types:
– Getting a wrong value.
– Getting an error.
– Formula displayed as-is and not calculated.

Let’s illustrate these 3 cases with some examples:

• Getting a wrong value

This may occur when you enter a value in an already formatted cell with an inappropriate format type, or when you apply a different format to a cell already containing a value.

The following table details some examples:

• Getting an error

This occurs when you enter a text preceded with a symbol of a dash, or plus, or equal, as an element of a list.

Excel wrongly interprets the text as a formula and show the error “The formula contains unrecognized text”.

• Formula displayed as-is and not calculated

In the following example, we tried to calculate the total of prices from cell B2 to B6 using the Excel SUM function, but Excel doesn’t calculate our formula and just displayed it as-is.

The source of the problem is that the result cell, B7, was previously formatted as text before entering the formula.

2- How to correct wrong cell format type issues in Excel

To correct cell format type issues in Excel, apply the right format in the “Number Format” drop-down list, and sometimes, you’ll also need to re-enter the content of the cell. For cells with formulas displayed as text, choose the “General” format, then double click in the cell and press Enter.

In Excel, you aren’t limited to using built-in number formats. You can define your own custom number formats to display values as thousands or millions (23K or 95.3M), add leading zeros, display » — » for zero values, make negative values red, add bullets, and much more.

Watch the video we created to go along with this article!

How to Create a Custom Number Format

To create a custom number format, it is easiest to begin with a built-in format. Open the Format Cells dialog box by pressing Ctrl+1 (or right-click on a cell and select Format Cells) and select the Number tab (see the image below). Then (1) Choose Custom from the Category list, (2) Select a built-in format similar to what you want, and (3) Edit the format string in the Type field.

Number Format Codes

A number format string uses up to 4 different codes, separated by semicolons, as shown in the image below.

Instead of explaining the syntax in detail at this point, let’s take a look at some examples and learn as we go.

Some of the characters like #, 0, @, etc. have special meanings. Some codes like [Red] can change the font color, and quotes can be used to display text or special characters. The table below summarizes some of these special characters.

Special Characters in Number Formats

Character	Description
#	A digit placeholder
0	A digit that is to be displayed even if it is zero
,	(Comma) Interpreted as a 1000’s marker
@	Represents the value displayed as text
*	(Asterisk) Repeats the next character to fill the cell
[ColorCode]	See the section below about using color codes
[<=100]	Conditional operators (valid only in the Positive and Negative sections)
/	Used for fractions such as # #/12 or as the / character for dates
» «	(Quotes) Used to display whatever is contained within the quotes as text, such as 0.00 «feet»
d or dd ddd dddd	Day number (0-31 or 00-31) Abbreviated day of week (Mon, Tue, etc.) Full day of week (Monday, Tuesday, etc.)
m or mm mmm mmmm mmmmm	Month number (0-12 or 00-12) Abbreviated month name (Jan, Feb, etc.) Full month name (January, February, etc.) First letter of the month (J, F, M, etc.)
y or yy yyyy	Year (0-99 or 00-99) Full year (1900-9999)
h or hh m or mm s or ss	Hour (0-23 or 00-23) Minutes (0-59 or 00-59) Seconds (0-59 or 00-59)

NOTE Some characters are specific to locale/language settings. For example J is used for Year in some countries.

Custom Number Format Examples

The examples below show some of the custom number formats that I’ve found the most useful. This isn’t a comprehensive list of all possible number formats. See support.microsoft.com to search for other articles on this subject.

TIP Using a custom number format only affects the displayed value. A formula that references the cell will use the stored value no matter how it is displayed. This means you can still use a formula to refer to the value even though the number might be displayed as «12 ft.»

To see these examples in action, download the Excel file below.

Download the Example File (CustomNumberFormats.xlsx)

Custom Number Format for Thousands and Millions

Format Code	Value	Displayed As	Description
0,K 0.0,K 0.0, «Thousand»	23543	24K 23.5K 23.5 Thousand	Display values in thousands, using the letter K to indicate thousands. The «K» is just a displayed character — it has no special meaning in the number format string. If you want to display more than one letter, you need to enclose the characters in quotes, like the «Thousand» example.
0,,»M» 0.0,,»M» 0.0,, «Million»	23543000	24M 23.5M 23.5 Million	Display values in millons, using the letter M to indicate millions. Note that in this case, you need two commas.

NOTE These are very useful for chart axes and labels.

Display Leading Zeros and Include Commas

Format Code	Value	Displayed As	Description
000 00000	50.8	051 00051	Display values with leading zeros. This does not convert the value to text — it is only a display format.
#,##0.0	3543.46	3,543.5	Display values using commas to separate thousands, millions, etc. The # sign is used as a placeholder, meaning that if there are no 10’s, 100’s, or 1000’s, don’t display them.

Display Units Without Converting to Text

Format Code	Value	Displayed As
• Display a number and text in the same cell using the conditions [=1] and [>1]. The value is stored as a number, so you can still do calculations on the number of people.
[=1]# «person»;[>1]# «people»;0	1 5 0	1 person 5 people 0
• Display a number and text in the same cell. The value is stored as a number, so you can still do calculations.
0.0 «ft» 0.0 «kg» # #/## «in»	2.2 4.5 6.25	2.2 ft 4.5 kg 6 1/4 in
• Display a numeric YYMMDD value in years, months, days.
##»y» ##»m» ##»d»	360712	36y 07m 12d

Special Time Formats

There are quite a few built-in time formats to choose from. The following may be less known.

Format Code	Value	Displayed As	Description
[h]:mm:ss [h]:mm [mm]:ss [ss]	49:03:47	49:03:47 49:03 2943:47 176627	Shows elapsed time in hours, minutes or seconds. Note that time does not round up.
h:mm A/P h:mm a/p	2:25 PM	2:25 P 2:25 p	Displays time using «a» for AM and «p» for PM. Useful when trying to minimize column widths without making fonts smaller.

Including Special Symbols

Some ascii and unicode characters can be copied and pasted directly into the format code. This can be handy for displaying the degrees symbol for temperatures as well as other tricks like showing up and down arrows or bulleted lists.

Format Code	Value	Displayed As	Description
#.#»°»	98.7	98.7°	Display temperature in degrees with the ° symbol.
[Color10]▲0;[Red]▼-0	5 -5	▲5 ▼-5	Display special symbols for positive and negative, combined with colors.
;;;»•» @	Eggs Bacon	• Eggs • Bacon	Create a bulleted list using a special symbol for the bullet. When you enter text, the bullet will be displayed. Numbers and zero values will not be displayed.

Displaying Fractions

Format Code	Value	Displayed As	Description
# ??/12	5.75 12.5	5 9/12 12 6/12	Display a decimal number of feet as feet and inches (rounded to the nearest inch). Or display a decimal year in terms of years and months.
# ??/100	5.2 5.05 12.81	5 20/100  5  5/100 12 81/100	Using ??/100 will help line up values in a column (as opposed to just using ?/100). Note that fractions are automatically rounded.
?/2	5.2	10/2	Displays a simple fraction as numerator/denominator.

Trailing and Leading Characters to Fill a Cell

The asterisk (*) in a format code repeats the following character to fill the width of the cell.

Format Code	Value	Displayed As	Description
— @ *-	✁	— ✁ —————-	Trailing characters.
*.@	pg 2	………………pg 2	Leading characters

Custom Number Formats for Chart Axes and Labels

Format Code	Value	Displayed As	Description
0 «AD»;0 «BC»	247 -600	247 AD 600 BC	AD and BC Years. Use negative numbers for BC years and positive numbers for AD years.
mmm{Ctrl+j}yyyy	8/20/18	Aug 2018	Add a Carriage Return within the custom number format (e.g. between dddd and mmm) by pressing Ctrl+j.
[Color10]▲0.0%;[Red]▼-0.0%	15.23% -23.57%	▲15.2% ▼-23.6%	Display arrows for positive and negative, combined with colors and percentages.

A couple of these examples can be seen in the image below. However, notice that the data labels don’t use color codes, so the percentages are shown only as black text rather than red and green. Too bad. Maybe Microsoft will fix that some day.

NOTE Editing a custom number format that contains a carriage return is tricky because you can’t see the second row. This is why I write out the code first using «{Ctrl+j}» or just «{j}» and then delete the «{j}» and press Ctrl+j in its place.

When adding a custom number format using the Format Axis window pane, you may not be able to press Ctrl+j to add a carriage return. In that case, first edit the format of the data source, then click on the Link to Source box as shown in the image to the right. After doing that, you can uncheck the Link to Source box and modify the original data source formatting.

Other Tricks

Format Code	Value	Displayed As	Description
;;;	anything		Display nothing, regardless of the value.
0.#	2	2.	Display a decimal point without a 0 after the decimal (2. instead of 2.0)
???.???	1.2 12.3 123.456	1.2    12.3   123.456	Vertically align the decimal point when displaying a column of numbers.

NOTE If you are looking for format codes for phone numbers, social security numbers, or zip codes, look in the Special category within the list of built-in number formats.

Custom Number Format Color Codes

By using color format codes such as [Red] or [Blue] or [Color10], you have a limited ability to alter the color of the font via custom number formats. The most common use I’ve seen is to color negative values red. However, one of the examples above also shows how you might want to use a green arrow.

Even though a new color palette was introduced in Excel 2007, the color codes for custom number formats are still based on the old color palette for the Excel 97-2003 format. I created the graphic below to provide a quick reference.

I made the above color code reference match the layout of the old color palette because there is not a consistent pattern to the numbering.

Define Your Own Color: You can modify the color palette in newer versions of Excel by going to File > Options > Save > Colors. This allows you to change the color associated with the Color1 through Color56 codes. This means that Color10 might not always be a dark green. If you purposely change the color palette (or somebody else does), Color10 might be some other color.

Excel 2016: File > Options > Save > Colors

NOTE The Color1-56 codes in Google Sheets are fixed colors and aren’t changed when you upload an Excel file with a customized color palette.

Conditional Operators

Conditional operators such as [<100] can be used to change the formatting in cases where positive;negative;0 is not how you want the divisions defined.

For example, the following format will display numbers less than 10 red, numbers between 10 and 20 green, other numbers blue, and text will be displayed based on the cell’s font color: [Red][<10]0.00;[Green][<=20]0.00;[Blue]0.00;@

You are limited to 2 numeric conditions, which you place in the negative and positive sections of the format code.

Another use of conditional operators is to display phone numbers with and without an area code, depending on how many digits are in the phone number like this: [<=9999999]###-####;(###)###-####. This assumes that the phone numbers are entered as numbers and not text values. Meaning, that if you actually enter 123-1234 into a cell in Excel, it will be interpreted as a text value, not a number. The phone number format will display 1234567 to 123-4567 and it will display 1234567890 to (123)456-7890.

Custom Location Codes for Dates

When displaying month names and weekday names for dates, you can use location codes such as [$-fr-CA] at the beginning of the format code to tell Excel to display the names in other languages. To learn what the code is for a specific language and location, use the Format Cells dialog in Excel, choose one of the built-in Date formats, then choose the Locale (location) from the drop-down list. Then you can return to the Format Cells dialog box and click on the Custom tab to see what location code was added.

Format Code	Value	Displayed As	Language/Location
[$-en-US](ddd) mmm d, yyyy	10/1/2018	(Mon) Oct 1, 2018	English (United States)
[$-fr-CA](ddd) mmm d, yyyy	8/1/2018	(mer.) août 1, 2018	French (Canada)
[$-de-DE](ddd) mmm d, yyyy	10/1/2018	(Mo) Okt 1, 2018	German (Germany)

Other Notes About Custom Number Formats

To delete a custom number format, open the Format Cells dialog box, select the custom format from the list, then click Delete. When you delete a custom number format, all values in your workbook that use that format will revert to the General format.

Custom number formats that you create are saved with the file. If you want to use the custom format in a different file, you can copy/paste the formatting from your other file by copying and pasting the formatted cell or using the Format Painter tool.

References

• Number Formats for Charts by Jon Peltier, Excel MVP
• Excel Custom Number Format Guide by Mynda Treacy, Excel MVP

---

Formatting

Excel has many ways to format and style a spreadsheet.

Why format and style your spreadsheet?

• Make it easier to read and understand
• Make it more delicate

Styling is about changing the looks of cells, such as changing colors, font, font sizes, borders, number formats, and so on.

The most used styling functions are:

• Colors
• Fonts
• Borders
• Number formats
• Grids

There are two ways to access the styling commands in Excel:

1. The Ribbon
2. Formatting menu, by right clicking cells

Read more about the Ribbon in the Excel overview chapter.

---

Styling Commands in Ribbon

The Ribbon can be expanded by clicking the arrow/caret-down icon on the right side. This gives access to more commands:

---

---

Styling Commands, Right Clicking Cells

You can also right-click on any cell to style it:

Styling commands can be accessed from both views.

---

Chapter summary

Formatting is used to make spreadsheets more readable. There are many ways to add styles. The most common ones are; Color, Font, Number format and Grids.

---

 

Is this related to Excel ? Yes Mam it is 😆 !!

This picture speaks miles about what we are going to discuss today.. err.. not a slimming course or anything but how custom formatting can change the way how your data looks like!! 😀

Custom formatting is like a make-up of your data

Guys get your eyes off the picture and lets get started .. shall we? And the I think the best way to start is to tell you that custom formatting does not actually change the underlying data, but only changes the way how it looks! (kept in bold because that is really important and true in most cases)

Ok!! So where is Custom Formatting in Excel ?

You customize formatting of your data with a code you write in the Format Cells dialogue box (shortcut Ctrl +1) in the custom formatting section

Structure & Thumb Rules of Writing a Custom Formatting code

We’ll discuss how to make a code in while but let’s discuss some ground rules first!!

Thumb Rule 1) The custom formatting code can consist of 4 parts

1. The Positive Numbers (1, 4, 100, 5000 etc)
2. The Negative Numbers (-1, -5, -10, -1000 etc)
3. Zero (0)
4. Text (Hi dude, Million, Days etc)

You don’t necessarily need to write the code for all 4 parts. Excel will assume the following in case you choose to omit one or more parts of the code

1. If you writing only the first part –  then it applies to all numbers (+ve, -ve and zeros)
2. Writing only first and second part – then first part formats +ve numbers and zeros and second part formats the -ve numbers
3. Three parts – 1st formats the +ve numbers, 2nd formats the -ve numbers, 3rd formats the zeros

Thumb Rule 2) You have to follow the sequence while writing the code. I mean you cannot write the code for a text first and then for a negative number… it wont work!! So the sequence for all 4 parts of the code will be  Positive Number Code ; Negative Number Code ; Zero Code ; Text Code

Thumb Rule 3) Always separate the parts of codes with a semicolon. Remember the separator is a semicolon (;) not a comma. Simple right?

Thumb Rule 4) Put the text in the code in double quotes, example “Mn”

Writing your first code .. a simple case!

Consider this Sale/Profit data over 6 months

Your boss asks you to format it this way

1. Stacey (even if you are not Stacey 😀 ), all the positive sales/profit numbers should appear this way – $ 173.0 Mn
2. All negative (profit) numbers should appear this way in red color- $ (14.0) Mn
3. All zeros should be replaced with a hypen –

According to the rules our code will follow this sequence positive number code ; negative number code  ; zero code

1. Select your data (numbers only)
2. And go to cell formatting (Ctrl+1) and click custom and start writing the code (by replacing the General)

Code for positive numbers For excel to format any profit/sales number in one decimal prefixed with a $ sign and suffixed with a Mn, we need a variable for sales/profit number.

0 is a variable for any number. So we will write $ 0.0 “Mn”;

Code for negative numbers Now negative number need to be in red and in brackets, rest is the same as positive number coding

Thumb Rule 5) When applying color to any part of the code, make sure the color is written first in square brackets [Red]

So our revised code looks like – $ 0.0 “Mn”;[Red] $ (0.0) “Mn”;

Finally Code for zeros We don’t need to see zeros, instead we want a hypen or a dash so our revised quote looks like $ 0.0 “Mn”;[Red] $ (0.0) “Mn”;–

Note: code is separated with semicolon. Press Ok and see the result in the excel file

The positive, negative and zero have been formatted just as the way your boss wanted!  Custom Formatting – Example (download file from down below)

Characters used in Coding

There are whole range of variables and characters that can be used for different utilities in your code

Character	Utility
” “	Displays any text between the double quotes
	Displays the next character as it is
@	Character for displaying any text
*	Repeats the preceding character to fill the width of the cell
#	Displays only significant digits and does not display insignificant zero’s, for example it won’t display 0001 rather will display 1
0	Displays both significant (non zero numbers) andinsignificant zero’s, for example the code 000 will dispay 001,002 and so on
.	Decimal separator shows the number of decimal places after the number, for example 0.0 will show insignificant zeros and 0.# will only significant decimal places
,	Comma if suffixed after # or a 0 it divides the number by 1000, for example 0, ‘k’ will result the number (15000) in 15 k
%	The percentage (%) symbol multiplies the number by 100 and suffixes the number with a % symbol, for example #.0% will result in 12.0%

Date & Time in Custom Formatting

Numbers can also be formatted as dates and time using these characters

d	Shows the number of the day
dd	Shows the number of the day in 2 digit places. For example 07, 09, 15
ddd	Shows the day in words. For exampleSun,Mon, Tue
dddd	Shows the day as unabbreviated. For example Monday, Tuesday, Friday
m	Shows the month number from 1-12
mm	Shows the month number in 2 digits for example 01, 02, 10
mmm	Showsthe month as a short word, example Jan, Feb, Mar
mmmm	Shows the month as a complete word, example March, April, September
yy	Show the last digits of the year, for example 2014 will be shown as 14 and 2000 as 00
yyyy	Shows all four digits of the year

h	Shows the hour
hh	Shows the hour in a 2 digit number example 02 or 09
[h]	Shows the total hours, for example a number (2) formatted as [h] will show 48
m	Shows the minutes. Note it only shows minutes if used as time formatting code (hh mm ss) otherwise it shows single digit months
mm	Shows minutes as a two digit number. Note it only shows minutes if used as time formatting code (hh:mm:ss) otherwise it shows single digit months
[m]	Shows the total minutes, for example a number (2) formatted as [m] will show 2880
S	Shows seconds
ss	Shows the seconds in a 2 digit number example 02 or 59
[s]	Shows the total seconds, for example a number (2) formatted as [s] will show 172800
am/pm	Adds am/pm after the time as per 12 hour clock

Adding Conditions to your custom formatting code !

This is a real game changer and alters some of the thumb rules that have been with us this far. In custom formatting you can also apply conditions

if the number is > than 100 then color is red else color is blue

The new rules!

1. The conditions are written in square brackets [condition]
2. If any color needs to be applied with a condition then colors will come first in the code. For example [red] [condition]
3. The sequence of the condition is important – Excel stops reading the code further if the condition is met
4. Semicolon (;) is used to separate conditions
5. You can write 3 conditions at max

Consider this Code

[>=1000000] 0.0#,, “m”;[>=1000] 0.0#, “k”;0

1. Notice the semicolons. 2 semicolons for separating 3 conditions
2. 1st Condition (in square bracket) is checking if the number is more or equal to 1000000. If this condition is met then format the number as 1.0 m
3. 2nd Condition is checking if the number is greater or equal to 1000 then format the number as 1.0 k
4. 3rd Condition is checking if the number is not meeting any of the above conditions just write the number

This is how the code will format the following numbers

5293925	5.29 m
4761090	4.76 m
874911	874.91 k
390410	390.41 k
5246138	5.25 m
4514427	4.51 m
1785909	1.79 m
2802888	2.8 m

Now that we have by and large covered custom formatting next I will write some interesting codes. I think it has been a reasonably long discussion, but I really wanted to give you a comprehensive flavor of how this works, I will close here but once again will reiterate that custom formatting only changes how your data looks and not its actual value. Verify that by applying custom formatting and checking the value in the formula bar!!

How often do you use custom formatting and in what ways, please share and comment!!

Take Care!