Excel vba shapes types

VBA Coding With Shape Objects

In this comprehensive guide, you will be learning all the ways you can create and manipulate shapes with VBA macros.

Shapes are objects you can insert into your spreadsheet through the Insert Tab via the Shapes gallery button. These objects can add visualizations to your dashboards, store text, or even serve as buttons to launch macro code.

Here is an outline of the topics covered in this guide:

Creating A New Shape With AddShape()

To create a shape object in Excel using VBA, you must call the AddShape function.

The AddShape function has 4 required inputs in order to generate a new shape:

• Type — Name of the type of shape you wish to generate

• Left — Where on the spreadsheet the left side of the shape should be located

• Top — Where on the spreadsheet the top of the shape should be located

• Width — How wide your shape should be

• Height — How tall your shape should be

Here is a snippet of VBA code showing how to create 2 shapes and store the newly created shape to a variable for easy reference later on in your code.

Sub CreateShape()

Dim shp1 As Shape
Dim shp2 As Shape

‘Create & Store New Shape to Variable
  Set shp1 = ActiveSheet.Shapes.AddShape(msoShape16pointStar, _
    ActiveCell.Left, ActiveCell.Top, 80, 27)

‘Create & Store New Shape to Variable (use Enum Code)
  Set shp2 = ActiveSheet.Shapes.AddShape(94, _
    ActiveCell.Left, ActiveCell.Top, 80, 27)

End Sub

Continue reading through the next few sections to learn how to determine the type, size, and position values you should be using to create your desired shape.

Choosing A Shape Type

There are a TON of shape types available to you through VBA. There are so many in fact, that I have painstakenly gone through and visually cataloged them for your ease in the below slide show.

Once you have determined which shape you would like to create, grab either the shape textual name or the enumeration number. You will use this MSOAutoShapeType reference to code the exact shape you want.

If you have a shape already created on your spreadsheet, you can use the following code to figure out its enumeration code that you can reference in your VBA code.

Sub DetermineShapeType()
‘PURPOSE: Display The Shape Type of Selected Shape
‘SOURCE: www.TheSpreadsheetGuru.com

Dim ActiveShape As Shape
Dim UserSelection As Variant

‘Pull-in what is selected on screen
  Set UserSelection = ActiveWindow.Selection

‘Determine if selection is a shape
  On Error GoTo NoShapeSelected
    Set ActiveShape = ActiveSheet.Shapes(UserSelection.Name)
  On Error Resume Next

  ‘Tell User the Shape Type Enumeration Number
  MsgBox «The Select Shape Type = » & ActiveShape.AutoShapeType

Exit Sub

‘Error Handler
NoShapeSelected:
  MsgBox «You do not have a shape selected!»

  End Sub

Determining Shape Position

There are two properties you can modify to change the location of a shape on the spreadsheet with VBA. These two properties are the Left and Top values of the shape.

If you are unsure what the size of your shape should be, there are two popular ways you can size your shape:

Method 1: You can base it on the left and top positions of a cell on your spreadsheet.

The following VBA code shows you how to use the Left value of Cell B1 and the Top value of Cell B10 to reposition the rectangle shape that is created.

Sub ShapePositionFromCell()

Dim shp As Shape

‘Create Shape
  Set shp = ActiveSheet.Shapes.AddShape(msoShapeRectangle, _
    Range(«B1»).Left, Range(«B10»).Top, 100, 50)

End Sub

Method 2: You can position the shape to your liking manually on the spreadsheet and read the left and top positions using VBA.

The following VBA code will output a message box that displays the Left and Top positions of a currently selected shape (ActiveShape).

Sub DetermineShapePosition()
‘PURPOSE: Display Selected Shape’s Position
‘SOURCE: www.TheSpreadsheetGuru.com

Dim ActiveShape As Shape
Dim UserSelection As Variant

‘Pull-in what is selected on screen
  Set UserSelection = ActiveWindow.Selection

‘Determine if selection is a shape
  On Error GoTo NoShapeSelected
    Set ActiveShape = ActiveSheet.Shapes(UserSelection.Name)
  On Error Resume Next

  ‘Tell User the Shape Position Values
  MsgBox «Left Position = » & ActiveShape.Left & vbNewLine & _
    «Top Position = » & ActiveShape.Top

Exit Sub

‘Error Handler
NoShapeSelected:
  MsgBox «You do not have a shape selected!»

  End Sub

Determining Shape Size

There are two properties you can modify to change the size of a shape with VBA. These two properties are the Width and Height values of the shape.

If you are unsure what the size of your shape should be, there are two popular ways you can size your shape:

Method 1: You can base it on the size of a range of cells

Sub ShapeSizeFromRange()

Dim shp As Shape
Dim rng As Range

‘Provide Range for Shape Size
  Set rng = Range(«A1:C4»)

‘Create Shape
  Set shp = ActiveSheet.Shapes.AddShape(msoShapeRectangle, _
    ActiveCell.Left, ActiveCell.Top, rng.Width, rng.Height)

End Sub

Method 2: You can create the shape to your liking manually and read the width and height using VBA

Sub DetermineShapeSize()
‘PURPOSE: Display Selected Shape’s Size
‘SOURCE: www.TheSpreadsheetGuru.com

Dim ActiveShape As Shape
Dim UserSelection As Variant

‘Pull-in what is selected on screen
  Set UserSelection = ActiveWindow.Selection

‘Determine if selection is a shape
  On Error GoTo NoShapeSelected
    Set ActiveShape = ActiveSheet.Shapes(UserSelection.Name)
  On Error Resume Next

  ‘Tell User the Shape Position Values
  MsgBox «Width = » & ActiveShape.Width & vbNewLine & _
    «Height = » & ActiveShape.Height

Exit Sub

‘Error Handler
NoShapeSelected:
  MsgBox «You do not have a shape selected!»

  End Sub

Text Formatting

Sub CreateShapeWithText()

Dim shp As Shape

‘Create & Store New Shape to Variable
  Set shp = ActiveSheet.Shapes.AddShape(msoShape16pointStar, _
    ActiveCell.Left, ActiveCell.Top, 80, 27)

   ‘Add Text To Shape
  shp.TextFrame2.TextRange.Text = «My Awesome Shape!»

‘Bold/Italicize/Underline Text
  shp.TextFrame2.TextRange.Font.Bold = True
  shp.TextFrame2.TextRange.Font.Italic = True
  shp.TextFrame2.TextRange.Font.UnderlineStyle = msoUnderlineDottedLine

  ‘Change Text Color
  shp.TextFrame2.TextRange.Font.Fill.ForeColor.RGB = RGB(225, 140, 71)

‘Change Text Size
  shp.TextFrame2.TextRange.Font.Size = 14

‘Center Align Text
  shp.TextFrame.HorizontalAlignment = xlHAlignCenter
  shp.TextFrame.VerticalAlignment = xlVAlignCenter

End Sub

Fill Color & Borders

Sub CreateShapeWithBorder()

Dim shp As Shape

‘Create & Store New Shape to Variable
  Set shp = ActiveSheet.Shapes.AddShape(msoShapeRoundedRectangle, _
    ActiveCell.Left, ActiveCell.Top, 80, 27)

‘Light Orange Fill
  shp.Fill.ForeColor.RGB = RGB(253, 234, 218)

‘Add Dotted Border
  shp.Line.DashStyle = msoLineDashDotDot

‘Dark Orange Border
  shp.Line.ForeColor.RGB = RGB(252, 213, 181)

‘Adjust Border Thickness
  shp.Line.Weight = 2

‘Remove Border
  shp.Line.Visible = False

End Sub

Change Shape Type

If you are looking to change the shape type of an existing type, you can do so by setting the AutoShapeType to a different shape type value.

Sub ChangeShapeType()

Dim shp As Shape

‘Store specific shape on spreadsheet to a variable
  Set shp = ActiveSheet.Shapes(«Shape1»)

‘Change shape type to oval
  shp.AutoShapeType = msoShapeOval

End Sub

Create Your Own Macro Button With VBA Code

I personally cannot stand the native Excel form control button. It looks so outdated and really makes your spreadsheets look unprofessional. That is why I prefer to use VBA code to create a shape that looks like a button.

I thought this would be a great example to show you a real-world coding example where I need to create and format a shape to have a specific appearance. The following VBA macro code puts everything we have covered in this guide together and provides you with some sample code that comprises of a true shape-building solution.

Sub Create_Button()
‘PURPOSE: Creates a SpreadsheetGuru macro button shape
‘SOURCE: www.TheSpreadsheetGuru.com

Dim bttn As Shape

‘Create & Position Macro Button
  Set bttn = ActiveSheet.Shapes.AddShape(msoShapeRoundedRectangle, _
    ActiveCell.Left, ActiveCell.Top, 80, 27)

‘Modify Text Formatting
  With bttn.TextFrame2.TextRange
    .Text = «Macro»
    .Font.Bold = msoTrue
    .Font.Fill.ForeColor.RGB = RGB(0, 0, 0)
    .Font.Size = 14
  End With

‘Center Alignment
  bttn.TextFrame.HorizontalAlignment = xlHAlignCenter
  bttn.TextFrame.VerticalAlignment = xlVAlignCenter

‘Light Gray Fill
  bttn.Fill.ForeColor.RGB = RGB(217, 217, 217)

‘No Border
  bttn.Line.Visible = msoFalse

End Sub

Loop Through All Shapes Of Specific Type

If you need to target a specific shape type on your spreadsheet, you can create a loop that tests the AutoShapeType value to filter your results.

The following VBA code example loops through all shape objects in the currently selected spreadsheet and only changes the fill color of the rectangle shapes.

Sub ChangeRectangleShapes()

Dim shp As Shape

‘Loop through each shape on ActiveSheet
  For Each shp In ActiveSheet.Shapes

      ‘Only modify rectangle shapes
      If shp.AutoShapeType = msoShapeRectangle Then
        shp.Fill.ForeColor.RGB = RGB(253, 234, 218)
      End If

        Next shp

End Sub

I Hope This Microsoft Excel Article Helped!

Hopefully, I was able to explain how you use VBA code to create and format shapes on your Excel spreadsheets. If you have any questions about these techniques or suggestions on how to improve them, please let me know in the comments section below.

About The Author

Hey there! I’m Chris and I run TheSpreadsheetGuru website in my spare time. By day, I’m actually a finance professional who relies on Microsoft Excel quite heavily in the corporate world. I love taking the things I learn in the “real world” and sharing them with everyone here on this site so that you too can become a spreadsheet guru at your company.

Through my years in the corporate world, I’ve been able to pick up on opportunities to make working with Excel better and have built a variety of Excel add-ins, from inserting tickmark symbols to automating copy/pasting from Excel to PowerPoint. If you’d like to keep up to date with the latest Excel news and directly get emailed the most meaningful Excel tips I’ve learned over the years, you can sign up for my free newsletters. I hope I was able to provide you with some value today and I hope to see you back here soon!

— Chris

How to create autoshapes, lines and connectors in VBA macros

Part one of an eight-part series of blogs

Posted by
Andy Brown
on 25 January 2014

For a long time I’ve always shied away from this subject, but it turns out
that I shouldn’t have: shapes in VBA are surprisingly easy
to create and control!

This blog goes into the minutiae of how to create autoshapes in VBA. 
All of the examples are for Excel, but they’ll work just as well for PowerPoint
VBA or Word VBA.

First, however, there are two things that you can do to make your shape-life
easier (it sounds like something out of a bad science fiction novel …).

Tip 1: Use Excel 2010 or later

Admittedly you may not have much choice about this, but if you possibly can,
use Excel 2010 in preference to Excel 2007.  Imagine that you want to add a
rectangle while recording a macro.  Here’s what this produces when
recording a macro in Excel 2010:

Here’s exactly the same thing recorded in Excel 2007:

You can easily survive using shapes without recording anything, but being
able to record commands can make life much easier!

Tip 2: Use a Worksheet variable

For some reason, VBA doesn’t support autocompletion that well when you’re
working with worksheets.  For example, as you type in the following lines
of code you won’t see any Intellisense to help you:

Websites will tell you that this is because Excel doesn’t know whether you’re
working with a worksheet or a chart, but I can’t see how this can be true for
the first line of code above.  Whatever …

By contrast, if you use an object variable to refer to a worksheet life will
be MUCH easier:

With those two tips out of the way, let’s start with the basics of working
with shapes! 

Although our two-day advanced VBA course (online
or classroom) doesn’t usually get onto working with
shapes (it’s a bit TOO niche), you will learn lots of other advanced VBA
techniques.  Meet the owls behind the blogs, and treat yourself to a place
on one of our VBA courses!

This blog has 0 threads

Add post