Formatting marks in excel

Format text in cells

Formatting text or numbers can make them appear more visible especially when you have a large worksheet. Changing default formats includes things like changing the font color, style, size, text alignment in a cell, or apply formatting effects. This article shows you how you can apply different formats and also undo them.

If you want text or numbers in a cell to appear bold, italic, or have a single or double underline, select the cell and on the Home tab, pick the format you want:

Change font style, size, color, or apply effects

For a different font style, click the arrow next to the default font Calibri and pick the style you want.

To increase or decrease the font size, click the arrow next to the default size 11 and pick another text size.

To change the font color, click Font Color and pick a color.

To add a background color, click Fill Color next to Font Color .

To apply strikethrough, superscript, or subscript formatting, click the Dialog Box Launcher, and select an option under Effects.

Change the text alignment

You can position the text within a cell so that it is centered, aligned left or right. If it’s a long line of text, you can apply Wrap Text so that all the text is visible.

Select the text that you want to align, and on the Home tab, pick the alignment option you want.

Clear formatting

If you change your mind after applying any formatting, to undo it, select the text, and on the Home tab, click Clear > Clear Formats.

Change font style, size, color, or apply effects

For a different font style, click the arrow next to the default font Calibri and pick the style you want.

To increase or decrease the font size, click the arrow next to the default size 11 and pick another text size.

To change the font color, click Font Color and pick a color.

To add a background color, click Fill Color next to Font Color .

For boldface, italics, underline, double underline, and strikethrough, select the appropriate option under Font.

Change the text alignment

You can position the text within a cell so that it is centered, aligned left or right. If it’s a long line of text, you can apply Wrap Text so that all the text is visible.

Select the text that you want to align, and on the Home tab, pick the alignment option you want.

Clear formatting

If you change your mind after applying any formatting, to undo it, select the text, and on the Home tab, click Clear > Clear Formats.

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How to control and understand settings in the Format Cells dialog box in Excel

Summary

Microsoft Excel lets you change many of the ways it displays data in a cell. For example, you can specify the number of digits to the right of a decimal point, or you can add a pattern and border to the cell. You can access and modify the majority of these settings in the Format Cells dialog box (on the Format menu, click Cells).

The «More Information» section of this article provides information about each of the settings available in the Format Cells dialog box and how each of these settings can affect the way your data is presented.

More Information

There are six tabs in the Format Cells dialog box: Number, Alignment, Font, Border, Patterns, and Protection. The following sections describe the settings available in each tab.

Number Tab

Auto Number Formatting

By default, all worksheet cells are formatted with the General number format. With the General format, anything you type into the cell is usually left as-is. For example, if you type 36526 into a cell and then press ENTER, the cell contents are displayed as 36526. This is because the cell remains in the General number format. However, if you first format the cell as a date (for example, d/d/yyyy) and then type the number 36526, the cell displays 1/1/2000.

There are also other situations where Excel leaves the number format as General, but the cell contents are not displayed exactly as they were typed. For example, if you have a narrow column and you type a long string of digits like 123456789, the cell might instead display something like 1.2E+08. If you check the number format in this situation, it remains as General.

Finally, there are scenarios where Excel may automatically change the number format from General to something else, based on the characters that you typed into the cell. This feature saves you from having to manually make the easily recognized number format changes. The following table outlines a few examples where this can occur:

If you type	Excel automatically assigns this number format
1.0	General
1.123	General
1.1%	0.00%
1.1E+2	0.00E+00
1 1/2	# ?/?
$1.11	Currency, 2 decimal places
1/1/01	Date
1:10	Time

Generally speaking, Excel applies automatic number formatting whenever you type the following types of data into a cell:

Built-in Number Formats

Excel has a large array of built-in number formats from which you can choose. To use one of these formats, click any one of the categories below General and then select the option that you want for that format. When you select a format from the list, Excel automatically displays an example of the output in the Sample box on the Number tab. For example, if you type 1.23 in the cell and you select Number in the category list, with three decimal places, the number 1.230 is displayed in the cell.

These built-in number formats actually use a predefined combination of the symbols listed below in the «Custom Number Formats» section. However, the underlying custom number format is transparent to you.

The following table lists all of the available built-in number formats:

Number format	Notes
Number	Options include: the number of decimal places, whether or not the thousands separator is used, and the format to be used for negative numbers.
Currency	Options include: the number of decimal places, the symbol used for the currency, and the format to be used for negative numbers. This format is used for general monetary values.
Accounting	Options include: the number of decimal places, and the symbol used for the currency. This format lines up the currency symbols and decimal points in a column of data.
Date	Select the style of the date from the Type list box.
Time	Select the style of the time from the Type list box.
Percentage	Multiplies the existing cell value by 100 and displays the result with a percent symbol. If you format the cell first and then type the number, only numbers between 0 and 1 are multiplied by 100. The only option is the number of decimal places.
Fraction	Select the style of the fraction from the Type list box. If you do not format the cell as a fraction before typing the value, you may have to type a zero or space before the fractional part. For example, if the cell is formatted as General and you type 1/4 in the cell, Excel treats this as a date. To type it as a fraction, type 0 1/4 in the cell.
Scientific	The only option is the number of decimal places.
Text	Cells formatted as text will treat anything typed into the cell as text, including numbers.
Special	Select one of the following from the Type box: Zip Code, Zip Code + 4, Phone Number, and Social Security Number.

Custom Number Formats

If one of the built-in number formats does not display the data in the format that you require, you can create your own custom number format. You can create these custom number formats by modifying the built-in formats or by combining the formatting symbols into your own combination.

Before you create your own custom number format, you need to be aware of a few simple rules governing the syntax for number formats:

Each format that you create can have up to three sections for numbers and a fourth section for text.

The first section is the format for positive numbers, the second for negative numbers, and the third for zero values.

These sections are separated by semicolons.

If you have only one section, all numbers (positive, negative, and zero) are formatted with that format.

You can prevent any of the number types (positive, negative, zero) from being displayed by not typing symbols in the corresponding section. For example, the following number format prevents any negative or zero values from being displayed:

To set the color for any section in the custom format, type the name of the color in brackets in the section. For example, the following number format formats positive numbers blue and negative numbers red:

Instead of the default positive, negative and zero sections in the format, you can specify custom criteria that must be met for each section. The conditional statements that you specify must be contained within brackets. For example, the following number format formats all numbers greater than 100 as green, all numbers less than or equal to -100 as yellow, and all other numbers as cyan:

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Change the display of chart axes

For most chart types, you can display or hide chart axes. To make chart data easier to understand, you can also change the way they look.

Important: This article does NOT cover changing the scale of chart axes. For information about how to change to the scale, see:

Learn more about axes

Charts typically have two axes that are used to measure and categorize data: a vertical axis (also known as value axis or y axis), and a horizontal axis (also known as category axis or x axis). 3-D column, 3-D cone, or 3-D pyramid charts have a third axis, the depth axis (also known as series axis or z axis), so that data can be plotted along the depth of a chart. Radar charts do not have horizontal (category) axes, and pie and doughnut charts do not have any axes.

Vertical (value) axis

Horizontal (category) axis

Depth (series) axis

The following describe how you can modify your charts to add impact and better convey information. For more info on what axes are and what you can do with them, see All about axes.

Note: The following procedure applies to Office 2013 and newer versions. Looking for Office 2010 steps?

Display or hide axes

Click anywhere in the chart for which you want to display or hide axes.

This displays the Chart Tools, adding the Design, and Format tabs.

On the Design tab, click the down arrow next to Add chart elements, and then hover over Axes in the fly-out menu .

Click the type of axis that you want to display or hide.

Adjust axis tick marks and labels

On a chart, click the axis that has the tick marks and labels that you want to adjust, or do the following to select the axis from a list of chart elements:

Click anywhere in the chart.

This displays the Chart Tools, adding the Design and Format tabs.

On the Format tab, in the Current Selection group, click the arrow in the Chart Elements box, and then click the axis that you want to select.

On the Format tab, in the Current Selection group, click Format Selection.

In the Axis Options panel, under Tick Marks, do one or more of the following:

To change the display of major tick marks, in the Major tick mark type box, click the tick mark position that you want.

To change the display of minor tick marks, in the Minor tick mark type drop-down list box, click the tick mark position that you want.

To change the position of the labels, under Labels, click the option that you want.

Tip To hide tick marks or tick-mark labels, in the Axis labels box, click None.

Change the number of categories between labels or tick marks

On a chart, click the horizontal (category) axis that you want to change, or do the following to select the axis from a list of chart elements:

Click anywhere in the chart.

This displays the Chart Tools, adding the Design, Layout, and Format tabs.

On the Format tab, in the Current Selection group, click the arrow in the Chart Elements box, and then click the axis that you want to select.

On the Format tab, in the Current Selection group, click Format Selection.

Under Axis Options, do one or both of the following:

To change the interval between axis labels, under Interval between labels, click Specify interval unit, and then in the text box, type the number that you want.

Tip Type 1 to display a label for every category, 2 to display a label for every other category, 3 to display a label for every third category, and so on.

To change the placement of axis labels, in the Label distance from axis box, type the number that you want.

Tip Type a smaller number to place the labels closer to the axis. Type a larger number if you want more distance between the label and the axis.

Change the alignment and orientation of labels

You can change the alignment of axis labels on both horizontal (category) and vertical (value) axes. When you have multiple-level category labels in your chart, you can change the alignment of all levels of labels. You can also change the amount of space between levels of labels on the horizontal (category) axis.

On a chart, click the axis that has the labels that you want to align differently, or do the following to select the axis from a list of chart elements:

Click anywhere in the chart.

This displays the Chart Tools, adding the Design and Format tabs.

On the Format tab, in the Current Selection group, click the arrow in the Chart Elements box, and then click the axis that you want to select.

On the Format tab, in the Current Selection group, click Format Selection.

In the Format Axis dialog box, click Text Options.

Under Text Box, do one or more of the following:

In the Vertical alignment box, click the vertical alignment position that you want.

In the Text direction box, click the text orientation that you want.

In the Custom angle box, select the degree of rotation that you want.

Tip You can also change the horizontal alignment of axis labels, by clicking the axis, and then click Align Left , Center , or Align Right on the Home toolbar.

Change text of category labels

You can change the text of category labels on the worksheet, or you can change them directly in the chart.

Change category label text on the worksheet

On the worksheet, click the cell that contains the name of the label that you want to change.

Type the new name, and then press ENTER.

Note Changes that you make on the worksheet are automatically updated in the chart.

Change the label text in the chart

In the chart, click the horizontal axis, or do the following to select the axis from a list of chart elements:

Click anywhere in the chart.

This displays the Chart Tools, adding the Design and Format tabs.

On the Format tab, in the Current Selection group, click the arrow in the Chart Elements box, and then click the horizontal (category) axis.

On the Design tab, in the Data group, click Select Data.

In the Select Data Source dialog box, under Horizontal (Categories) Axis Labels, click Edit.

In the Axis label range box, do one of the following:

Specify the worksheet range that you want to use as category axis labels.

Type the labels that you want to use, separated by commas — for example, Division A, Division B, Division C.

Note If you type the label text in the Axis label range box, the category axis label text is no longer linked to a worksheet cell.

Change how text and numbers look in labels

You can change the format of text in category axis labels or numbers on the value axis.

In a chart, right-click the axis that displays the labels that you want to format.

On the Home toolbar, click the formatting options that you want.

Tip You can also select the axis that displays the labels, and then use the formatting buttons on the Home tab in the Font group.

In a chart, click the axis that displays the numbers that you want to format, or do the following to select the axis from a list of chart elements:

Click anywhere in the chart.

This displays the Chart Tools, adding the Design and Format tabs.

On the Format tab, in the Current Selection group, click the arrow in the Chart Elements box, and then click the axis that you want to select.

On the Format tab, in the Current Selection group, click Format Selection.

Under Axis Options, Click Number, and then in the Category box, select the number format that you want.

Tip If the number format you select uses decimal places, you can specify them in the Decimal places box.

To keep numbers linked to the worksheet cells, select the Linked to source check box.

Note Before you format numbers as a percentage, make sure that the numbers on the chart have been calculated as percentages in the source data, and that they are displayed in decimal format. Percentages are calculated on the worksheet by using the equation amount / total = percentage. For example, if you calculate 10 / 100 = 0.1, and then format 0.1 as a percentage, the number will be correctly displayed as 10%.

Change the display of chart axes in Office 2010

Click anywhere in the chart for which you want to display or hide axes.

This displays the Chart Tools, adding the Design, Layout, and Format tabs.

On the Layout tab, in the Axes group, click Axes.

Click the type of axis that you want to display or hide, and then click the options that you want.

On a chart, click the axis that has the tick marks and labels that you want to adjust, or do the following to select the axis from a list of chart elements:

Click anywhere in the chart.

This displays the Chart Tools, adding the Design, Layout, and Format tabs.

On the Format tab, in the Current Selection group, click the arrow in the Chart Elements box, and then click the axis that you want to select.

On the Format tab, in the Current Selection group, click Format Selection.

Under Axis Options, do one or more of the following:

To change the display of major tick marks, in the Major tick mark type box, click the tick mark position that you want.

To change the display of minor tick marks, in the Minor tick mark type drop-down list box, click the tick mark position that you want.

To change the position of the labels, in the Axis labels box, click the option that you want.

Tip To hide tick marks or tick-mark labels, in the Axis labels box, click None.

On a chart, click the horizontal (category) axis that you want to change, or do the following to select the axis from a list of chart elements:

Click anywhere in the chart.

This displays the Chart Tools, adding the Design, Layout, and Format tabs.

On the Format tab, in the Current Selection group, click the arrow in the Chart Elements box, and then click the axis that you want to select.

On the Format tab, in the Current Selection group, click Format Selection.

Under Axis Options, do one or both of the following:

To change the interval between axis labels, under Interval between labels, click Specify interval unit, and then in the text box, type the number that you want.

Tip Type 1 to display a label for every category, 2 to display a label for every other category, 3 to display a label for every third category, and so on.

To change the placement of axis labels, in the Label distance from axis box, type the number that you want.

Tip Type a smaller number to place the labels closer to the axis. Type a larger number if you want more distance between the label and the axis.

You can change the alignment of axis labels on both horizontal (category) and vertical (value) axes. When you have multiple-level category labels in your chart, you can change the alignment of all levels of labels. You can also change the amount of space between levels of labels on the horizontal (category) axis.

On a chart, click the axis that has the labels that you want to align differently, or do the following to select the axis from a list of chart elements:

Click anywhere in the chart.

This displays the Chart Tools, adding the Design, Layout, and Format tabs.

On the Format tab, in the Current Selection group, click the arrow in the Chart Elements box, and then click the axis that you want to select.

On the Format tab, in the Current Selection group, click Format Selection.

In the Format Axis dialog box, click Alignment.

Under Text layout, do one or more of the following:

In the Vertical alignment box, click the vertical alignment position that you want.

In the Text direction box, click the text orientation that you want.

In the Custom angle box, select the degree of rotation that you want.

Tip You can also change the horizontal alignment of axis labels, by right-clicking the axis, and then click Align Left , Center , or Align Right on the Mini toolbar.

You can change the text of category labels on the worksheet, or you can change them directly in the chart.

Change category label text on the worksheet

On the worksheet, click the cell that contains the name of the label that you want to change.

Type the new name, and then press ENTER.

Note Changes that you make on the worksheet are automatically updated in the chart.

Change the label text in the chart

In the chart, click the horizontal axis, or do the following to select the axis from a list of chart elements:

Click anywhere in the chart.

This displays the Chart Tools, adding the Design, Layout, and Format tabs.

On the Format tab, in the Current Selection group, click the arrow in the Chart Elements box, and then click the horizontal (category) axis.

On the Design tab, in the Data group, click Select Data.

In the Select Data Source dialog box, under Horizontal (Categories) Axis Labels, click Edit.

In the Axis label range box, do one of the following:

Specify the worksheet range that you want to use as category axis labels.

Tip You can also click the Collapse Dialog Box button , and then select the range that you want to use on the worksheet. When you are finished, click the Expand Dialog Box button.

Type the labels that you want to use, separated by commas — for example, Division A, Division B, Division C.

Note If you type the label text in the Axis label range box, the category axis label text is no longer linked to a worksheet cell.

You can change the format of text in category axis labels or numbers on the value axis.

In a chart, right-click the axis that displays the labels that you want to format.

On the Mini toolbar, click the formatting options that you want.

Tip You can also select the axis that displays the labels, and then use the formatting buttons on the Home tab in the Font group.

In a chart, click the axis that displays the numbers that you want to format, or do the following to select the axis from a list of chart elements:

Click anywhere in the chart.

This displays the Chart Tools, adding the Design, Layout, and Format tabs.

On the Format tab, in the Current Selection group, click the arrow in the Chart Elements box, and then click the axis that you want to select.

On the Format tab, in the Current Selection group, click Format Selection.

Click Number, and then in the Category box, select the number format that you want.

Tip If the number format you select uses decimal places, you can specify them in the Decimal places box.

To keep numbers linked to the worksheet cells, select the Linked to source check box.

Note Before you format numbers as a percentage, make sure that the numbers on the chart have been calculated as percentages in the source data, and that they are displayed in decimal format. Percentages are calculated on the worksheet by using the equation amount / total = percentage. For example, if you calculate 10 / 100 = 0.1, and then format 0.1 as a percentage, the number will be correctly displayed as 10%.

Add tick marks on an axis

An axis can be formatted to display major and minor tick marks at intervals that you choose.

This step applies to Word for Mac only: On the View menu, click Print Layout.

Click the chart, and then click the Chart Design tab.

Click Add Chart Element > Axes > More Axis Options.

On the Format Axis pane, expand Tick Marks, and then click options for major and minor tick mark types.

After you add tick marks, you can change the intervals between the tick marks by changing the value in the Interval between marks box.

All about axes

Not all chart types display axes the same way. For example, xy (scatter) charts and bubble charts show numeric values on both the horizontal axis and the vertical axis. An example might be how inches of rainfall are plotted against barometric pressure. Both of these items have numeric values, and the data points will be plotted on the x and y axes relative to their numeric values. Value axes provide a variety of options, such as setting the scale to logarithmic.

Other chart types, such as column, line, and area charts, show numeric values on the vertical (value) axis only and show textual groupings (or categories) on the horizontal axis. An example might be how inches of rainfall are plotted against geographic regions. In this example, the geographic regions are textual categories of the data that are plotted on the horizontal (category) axis. The geographic regions will be uniformly spaced because they are text instead of values that can be measured. Consider this difference when you select a chart type, because the options are different for value and category axes. On a related note, the depth (series) axis is another form of category axis.

When you create a chart, tick marks and labels are displayed by default on axes. You can adjust the way that they are displayed by using major and minor tick marks and labels. To eliminate clutter in a chart, you can display fewer axis labels or tick marks on the horizontal (category) axis by specifying the intervals at which you want categories to be labeled, or by specifying the number of categories that you want to display between tick marks.

You can also change the alignment and orientation of the labels, and change or format the text and numbers that they display, for example, to display a number as a percentage.

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