Crossing out in excel

How to strikethrough in Excel

by Svetlana Cheusheva, updated on March 17, 2023

This short tutorial explains different ways to add, use and remove strikethrough format in Excel desktop, Excel Online and Excel for Mac.

Excel is great for manipulating numbers, but it does not always make clear how to format text values the way you want. Strikethrough is a vivid example.

It is super easy to cross out text in Microsoft Word — you simply click the strikethrough button on the ribbon. Naturally, you’d expect to see the same button on the Excel ribbon. But it’s nowhere to be found. So, how do I strikethrough text in Excel? By using any of the six methods described in this tutorial 🙂

How to strikethrough in Excel

To ensure that everyone is on the same page, let’s define the term first. What does it mean to strikethrough in Excel? Simply, to put a line through a value in a cell. There are a handful of different ways to do this, and we are going to begin with the fastest one.

Excel strikethrough shortcut

Want to have the job done as quickly as possible? Press a hotkey or key combination.

Here’s the keyboard shortcut to strikethrough in Excel: Ctrl + 5

The shortcut can be used on an entire cell, certain part of the cell contents, or a range of cells.

To apply the strikethrough format to a cell, select that cell, and press the shortcut:

To draw a line through all values in a range, select the range:

To strikethrough non-adjacent cells, select multiple cells while holding the Ctrl key, and then press the strikethrough shortcut:

To cross out part of the cell value, double-click the cell to enter the Edit mode, and select the text you want to strikethrough:

Apply strikethrough via cell format options

Another quick way to draw a line through a cell value in Excel is by using the Format Cells dialog. Here’s how:

1. Select one or more cells on which you want to apply the strikethrough format.
2. Press Ctrl + 1 or right-click the selected cell(s) and choose Format Cells… from the context menu.
3. In the Format Cells dialog box, go to the Font tab, and tick off the Strikethrough option under Effects.
4. Click OK to save the change and close the dialog.

Add a strikethrough button to Quick Access Toolbar

If you think that the above method requires too many steps, add the strikethrough button to the Quick Access Toolbar to always have it at your fingertips.

1. Click the small arrow in the upper left corner of the Excel window, and then click More Commands…
   
2. Under Choose commands from, select Commands Not in the Ribbon, then select Strikethrough in the list of commands, and click the Add button. This will add Strikethrough to the list of commands on the right pane, and you click OK:

Look at the upper left corner of your worksheet again, and you will find the new button there:

Put a strikethrough button onto Excel ribbon

If your Quick Access Toolbar is reserved only for the most frequently used commands, which strikethrough is not, place it onto the ribbon instead. As with QAT, it’s also one-time setup, performed in this way:

1. Right-click anywhere on the ribbon and select Customize the Ribbon… from the pop-up menu:
   
2. Since new buttons can only be added to custom groups, let’s create one. For this, select the target tab (Home in our case) and click the New Group button. Then, click Rename… to name the newly created group to your liking, say My Formats:
   
3. With the new group selected, perform the already familiar steps: under Choose commands from, select Commands Not in the Ribbon, find Strikethrough in the list of commands, select it, and click Add:
4. Click OK to save the changes, and find the Strikethrough button on your Excel ribbon:

You can now cross out text in Excel with a single button click! And it will also remind you the keyboard shortcut in case you forget it 🙂

Tip. By using Up and Down arrows in the Excel Options dialog box, you can move your custom group with the Strikethrough button to any position on the ribbon:

How to strikethrough automatically with conditional formatting

In case you are planning to use a strikethrough to cross out the completed tasks or activities in a checklist or to-do list, you may want Excel to do it for you automatically as you enter some text in a related cell, for example «done»:

The task can be easily accomplished with Excel Conditional Formatting:

1. Select all the cells you want to cross out on condition (A2:A6 in this example).
2. On the Home tab, in the Styles group, click Conditional Formatting >New Rule…
3. In the New Formatting Rule dialog box, select Use a formula to determine which cells to format.
4. In the Format values where this formula is true box, enter the formula that expresses the condition for your topmost cell:

=$B2=»Done»

Click the Format…

In the Format Cells dialog box, switch to the Font tab and select the Strikethrough Optionally, you can make some other formatting changes, e.g. set a light grey font color for crossed out entries:

Click OK to close the Format Cells dialog box, then click OK one more time to close the New Formatting Rule window, and you are all set!

Instead of defining a task status with text, you can insert checkboxes, link them to some cells (which you can hide later) and base your conditional formatting rule on the value in the linked cells (TRUE is a checkbox is checked, FALSE if not checked).

As the result, Excel will check off the completed tasks automatically depending on whether the checkbox is selected or not.

If you’d like to create something similar in your worksheets, the detailed steps can be found here: How to create a checklist with conditional formatting.

Add strikethrough with a macro

If you are not allergic to using VBA in your Excel worksheets, you can apply strikethrough on all selected cells with this line of code:

The step-by-step instructions on how to insert VBA code in Excel can be found here.

How to use strikethrough in Excel Online

In Excel Online, the strikethrough option is exactly where you’d expect to find it — next to the other formatting buttons on the Home tab, in the Font group:

However, there’s a fly in the ointment — it’s not possible to select non-adjacent cells or ranges in Excel Online. So, if you need to cross out multiple entries in different parts of your sheet, you will have to select each cell or a range of contiguous cells individually, and then click the strikethrough button.

The strikethrough shortcut ( Ctrl + 5 ) works perfectly in Excel Online too and is often the fastest way to toggle the strikethrough formatting on and off.

In case you are interested, you can learn more about how to move your worksheets in Excel Online.

How to strikethrough in Excel for Mac

A quick way to strikethrough text in Excel for Mac is by using this keyboard shortcut: ⌘ + SHIFT + X

It can also be done from the Format Cells dialog in the same way as in Excel for Windows:

1. Select the cell(s) or part of a cell value you wish to cross out.
2. Right-click the selection and chose Format Cells from the popup menu.
3. In the Format Cells dialog box, switch to the Font tab and select the Strikethrough checkbox:
   

How to remove strikethrough in Excel

The correct way to remove strikethrough from a cell depends on how you’ve added it.

Remove strikethrough added manually

If you applied strikethrough via a shortcut or cell format, then press Ctrl + 5 again, and the formatting will be gone.

A longer way would be opening the Format Cells dialog ( Ctrl + 1 ) and unchecking the Strikethrough box there:

Remove strikethrough added with conditional formatting

If strikethrough is added by a conditional formatting rule, then you need to remove that rule to get rid of strikethrough.

To have it done, select all the cells from which you want to remove strikethrough, go to the Home tab > В­ Styles group, and click Conditional Formatting > Clear Rules > Clear Rules from Selected Cells:

If some other conditional formatting rule(s) is applied to the same cells and you’d like to keep that rule, then click conditional Formatting > Manage Rules… and delete only the strikethrough rule.

That’s how you can add and remove the strikethrough formatting in Excel. I thank you for reading and hope to see you on our blog next week!

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How to Insert Cross Text Symbol in Excel & Google Sheets

This tutorial will demonstrate how to insert a cross text symbol into Excel and Google Sheets.

Inserting the Cross Text Symbol into Excel

Excel has a few options for inserting bullet points. The first is to use the Symbols feature.

1. In the Ribbon, select Insert > Symbols > Symbol.

2. The Symbol box will appear. You can resize the box if you wish so see more symbols by dragging the bottom right-hand corner of the box.

3. Change the font in the left-hand drop-down box to “Wingdings”.

4. Scroll down until you find the cross symbol and click on Insert.

5. Click Close to return to Excel.

You can also amend the font to Wingdings 2 and find the cross symbol in that character set.

Inserting a Cross Symbol Using the Wingdings Font and the Alt Code

We can also insert a cross symbol into Excel by changing the font to Wingdings in the Excel screen and typing the character û directly into a cell.

1. In the Ribbon, select Home > Font and then select Wingdings from the Font drop-down box.

2. Hold down the Alt key, and then type ALT + 0251.

3. The character û is inserted into Excel. The Wingdings font will display this character as a cross mark.

Inserting a Cross Mark Using the Wingdings 2 Font

In the Ribbon, select Home > Font and then select Wingdings 2 from the Font drop-down box.

In the selected cell, hold down the shift key and press the letter O (uppercase O).

Inserting the Cross Text Symbol into Google Sheets

Inserting a Cross Symbol Using the CHAR Function

We can insert cross symbols into Google Sheets by using the CHAR Function.

Select the cell you wish to insert your cross text symbol into and type in the CHAR Function with the relevant number (for example: 10007).

Using the numbers 10005, 10006, 1008, and 128502 with the CHAR Function will show slightly different cross marks.

Inserting a Cross Symbol Using Special Characters

Google Sheets does not have a symbol function. Google Documents, however, does. If you wish to insert symbols such as the cross mark into Google sheets you need to open a Google document and copy and paste from that document into the Google sheet.

1. In the File menu, select New > Document.

A new tab will open in the browser showing a new Google document.

2. In the Insert Menu, select Special characters.

We are able to select a variety of categories in the left drop-down box such as Symbol, Emoji, Punctuation etc.

3. Select Symbol in the left-hand drop-down box, and then select Miscellaneous in the right-hand box.

4. Click on the Ballot or Ballot Heavy symbol to insert the symbol into the Google document.

5. Click the close button to close the Special Characters box.

6. Highlight the symbol with your mouse and then press CTRL + C to copy the symbol.

7. Switch back to the Google sheet and press CTRL + V to paste the symbol.

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