What is a bottom border in excel

How to create, change and remove border in Excel

by Svetlana Cheusheva, updated on March 14, 2023

The tutorial shows how to border cells in Excel by using the predefined options and how to create your custom cell border style.

Sometimes Excel worksheets can be difficult to read because of dense information and complex structure. Adding border around cells can help you distinguish different sections, emphasize certain data, such as column headings or total rows, and make your worksheets better presentable and more attractive.

What are cell borders in Excel?

Border is a line around a cell or a block of cells in Excel. Generally, cell borders are used to accent a specific section of a spreadsheet to make it stand out. For example, you can insert a border to draw attention of viewers to totals or other important data on the sheet.

Please do not confuse cell borders with worksheet gridlines. Borders are ticker and more prominent. Unlike gridlines, cell borders do not appear in a worksheet by default, you need to apply them manually. When printing out a document, the borders will appear on printed pages regardless of whether you print gridlines or not.

Microsoft Excel offers a few different ways to add a border around a single cell or a ranges of cells.

How to create border in Excel

The fastest way to make a border in Excel is to apply one of the inbuilt options directly from the ribbon. Here’s how:

1. Select a cell or a range of cells to which you want to add borders.
2. On the Home tab, in the Font group, click the down arrow next to the Borders button, and you will see a list of the most popular border types.
3. Click the border you want to apply, and it will be immediately added to the selected cells.

For example, this is how you can apply an outside border around cells in Excel:

More examples of Excel cell borders can be found here.

• To apply a line colorand style other than defaults, choose the desired Line Color and/or Line Style under Draw Borders first, and then select borders.
• The Border button on the ribbon only provides access to outside border types. To access all available settings, including inside borders, click More Borders… at the bottom of the drop-down menu. This will open the Format Cells dialog box, which is explained in detail in the next section.

How to insert border in Excel with Format Cells dialog

The Format Cells dialog is the most effective method of adding borders in Excel. It gives you easy access to all the settings including the line color and thickness as well as a nice diagram preview.

To insert a border via the Format Cells dialog, this is what you need to do:

1. Select one or more cells to which you’d like to add borders.
2. Open the Format Cells dialog box by doing one of the following:
   • Click the down arrow next to the Borders button, and then click More Borders at the bottom of the drop-down list.
   • Right click the selected cells and choose Format Cells… from the context menu.
   • Press Ctrl+1 shortcut.

In the Format Cells dialog box, switch to the Border tab and choose the line style and color first. And then, either use Presets to add the outside or inside borders or construct the desired border by selecting individual elements such as border top, bottom, right or left. The preview diagram will reflect the changes immediately.

When done, click OK.

Excel border shortcuts

To quickly insert and remove cell borders, Excel provides a couple of keyboard shortcuts.

Add outside border

To add an outline border around the current selection, press the following keys at the same time.

Windows shortcut: Ctrl + Shift + &

Mac shortcut: Command + Option + 0

Remove all borders

To remove all borders within the current selection, use the following key combinations.

Windows shortcut: Ctrl + Shift + _

Mac shortcut: Command + Option + _

Note. Excel border shortcut does not give you control over the line color and thickness. To create borders professionally, it is recommended to use the Format Cells dialog that provides full access to all the settings.

Shortcuts for Format cells dialog

On the Borders tab of the Format Cells dialog, you can also use the following shortcuts toggle borders on and off:

• Left border: Alt + L
• Right border: Alt + R
• Top border: Alt + T
• Bottom border: Alt + B
• Upward diagonal: Alt + D
• Horizontal interior: Alt + H
• Vertical interior: Alt + V

Tip. In case you are adding multiple borders, it is sufficient to press Alt just once, and then you can hit only the letter keys. For example, to place the top and bottom borders, press Alt + T , and then B .

How to draw borders in Excel

Instead of selecting cells first, and then choosing from a set of built-in options, you can draw borders directly on the worksheet. Here’s how:

1. On the Home tab, in the Font group, click the down arrow next to Borders. Near the bottom of the drop-down menu, you will see the Draw Borders group of commands that let you choose a drawing mode, line color and style.
2. First, pick a Line Color and a Line Style. Once either one is selected, Excel automatically activates the Draw Border mode, and the cursor changes to a pencil.
3. You can now start drawing individual lines in the default Draw Border mode or switch to Draw Border Grid mode. The difference is as follows:
   • Draw Border allows drawing a border along any gridline, which works great when making irregular borders. Dragging across cells will create a regular rectangular border around a range.
   • Draw Border Grid places outside and inside borders at a time when you click and drag across cells. When you follow a gridline, a single line is added just like when using the Draw Border option.
4. To stop drawing borders, click the Border button on the ribbon. This will force Excel to exist the drawing mode, and the cursor will change back to a white cross.

Tip. To delete the entire border or any of its elements, use the Erase border feature as describe in Erasing borders.

How to create a custom border style in Excel

In none of the predefined cell borders meet your needs, you can create your own border style. Here are the steps to perform:

1. On the Home tab, in the Styles group, click Cell Styles. If you do not see the Cell Styles button, click the More button in the bottom right corner of the Styles box.
   
2. Near the bottom of the drop-down menu, click New Cell Style.
   
3. In the Style name box, type a name for your new cell style (Bottom double border in our case), and then click Format.
   
4. The Format Cells dialog box will open. You switch to the Border tab and select the line style, line color and borders of interest. When done, click OK.
   
5. In the Style dialog box, clear the boxes for any formatting that you do not want to include in the new style, and click OK. Done!
   

To apply your custom border style, just do the following:

1. Select the cells you’d like to format.
2. On the Home tab, in the Styles group, click the style you’ve created. Usually appears in the top left corner of the Styles box. If you do not see it there, then click the More button next to the Styles box, find your new style under Custom, and click on it.

Your custom style will be applied to the selected cells at once:

How to change the color and width of cell borders

When you add a cell border in Excel, a black (automatic) line color and a thin line style is used by default. To change the color and width of cell borders, please follow these steps:

1. Select the cells whose border you want to change.
2. Press Ctrl + 1 to open the Format Cells dialog box. Or right-click the selected cells, and then click Format Cells in the popup menu.
3. Switch to the Border tab and do the following:
   • From the Line box, choose the desired style for the border line.
   • From the Color box, pick the preferred line color.
   • In the Presets or Border section, select your existing border type.
   • Check the result on the preview diagram. If you are happy with the changes, click OK. If not, try another line style and color.

Examples of cell border in Excel

Below you will have a few examples of how your Excel borders may look like.

Outside border

To apply an outline border around cells, use either Outside Borders or Think Outside Borders option:

Top and bottom border

To apply top and bottom border in Excel with a single command, use this option:

Top and thick bottom border

To apply top and thick bottom border, use this one:

Bottom double border

To place a bottom double border in Excel, use the below command. This option comes especially handy for separating a total row:

Inside and outside borders

To place both inside and outside borders at a time, use the All Borders command:

To put only inside borders or use different colors and line styles for inside and outside borders, use either the Draw Borders feature the Format Cells dialog. The below image shows one of many possible results:

Creating borders in Excel — useful tips

The following tips will give you some insight into Excel cell borders that may help you use them more efficiently.

• Each border that you add or change will follow the current settings for the line style and thickness. So, be sure to choose the line color and style first, and then select the border type.
• Unlike gridlines that may or may not be visible on printouts, cell borders always appear on printed pages.
• To have cell borders inserted automatically, format your data as an Excel table and choose from a rich collection of predefined table styles.

How to remove a cell border in Excel

Depending on whether you want to delete all or specific borders, use one of the following techniques.

Remove all borders

To delete all borders within a range, this is what you need to do:

1. Select one or more cells that you wish to remove a border from.
2. On the Home tab, in the Font group, click the arrow next to Borders, and choose No Border.

Alternatively, you can use the remove borders shortcut: Ctrl + Shift + _

If you choose to remove all formatting in Excel, this will also remove cell borders.

Erase individual borders

To remove borders one at a time, use the Erase Border feature:

1. On the Home tab, in the Font group, click the arrow next to Borders, and choose Erase Border.
2. Click each individual border that you want to delete. It’s also possible to erase all borders in one go. For this, click Erase Border and drag the eraser across cells.
3. To exit the erasing mode, click the Border button.

That’s how to create and change borders in Excel. I thank you for reading and hope to see you on our blog next week!

Источник

Excel Borders (Table of Contents)

• Borders in Excel
• How to add Borders in Excel?

Borders in Excel

Borders are the boxes formed by lines in the cell in Excel. By keeping borders, we can frame any data and provide them with a proper define limit. To distinguish specific values, outline summarized values or separate data in ranges of cells; you can add a border around cells.

How to add Borders in Excel?

Adding borders in Excel is very easy and useful to outline or separate specific data or highlight some values in a worksheet. Normally, we can easily add all top, bottom, left, or right borders for selected cells in Excel. Option for Borders is available in the Home menu, under the font section with the icon of Borders. We can also use shortcuts to apply borders in Excel.

You can download this Borders Excel Template here – Borders Excel Template

Let’s understand how to add Borders in Excel.

Example #1

For accessing Borders, go to Home and select the option as shown in the below screenshot under the Font section.

Once we click on the option of Borders shown above, we will have a list of all kind of borders provided by Microsoft in its drop-down option, as shown below.

Here we have categorized Borders into 4 sections. This would be easy to understand because all sections are different from each other.

The first section is a basic section with only Bottom, Top, Left, and Right Borders. By this, we can only create one side border only for one cell or multiple cells.

The second section is the full border section, which has No Border, All Borders, Outside Borders, and Thick Box Borders. By this, we can create a full border that can cover a cell and a table as well. We can also remove the border as well from the selected cell or table by clicking on No Border.

The third section is a combination of the bottom borders, Bottom Double Border, Thick Bottom Border, Top and Bottom Border, Top and Thick Bottom Border, and Top Double Bottom Border.

These types of double borders are majorly used in underlining the headlines or important texts.

The Fourth section has a customized border section, where we can draw or create a border as per our need or make changes in the existing border type. We can change the color, thickness of the border as well in this section of Borders.

Once we click on the More Borders Option at the bottom, we will see a new dialog box named Format Cells, which is a more advanced option for creating Borders. It is shown below.

Example #2

We have seen the basic function and use for all kinds of borders and how to create those in the previous example. Now we will see an example where we will choose and implement different Borders and see how those Borders in any table or data can be framed.

We have a data table, which has details of Owner, Block, and Apartment No. Now we will frame the Borders and see how the data would look like.

As row 2 is the headline, we will prefer a double bottom line selected from the third section.

And all cell will be covered with a box of All Borders which can be selected from the second section.

And if we select Thick Border from the second section, then the whole table will be bound to a perfect box, and selected data will automatically get highlighted. Once we are done with all the mentioned border type, our table would like this, as shown below.

As we can see, the complete data table is getting highlighted and ready to be presented in any form.

Example #3

There is another way to frame borders in excel. This is one of the shortcuts of accessing the functions available in excel. For accessing borders, the shortcut way first selects the data we want to frame with borders and then press ALT + H + B simultaneously to enable the border menu in Excel.

ALT + H will enable the Home menu, B will enable the borders.

Once we do that, we will get a list of all kinds of borders available in excel. And this list itself will have the specific keys mentioned to set for any border as shown and circled in the below screenshot.

We can navigate to our required Border type by pressing the Key highlighted in the above screenshot, or else we can use direction keys to scroll up and down to get the desired border frame. Let’s use All Borders for this case by pressing ALT+H+B+A simultaneously after selecting the data table. Once we do that, we will see the selected data is now framed with all borders. And each cell will be now having its own border in black lines, as shown.

Let’s frame one more border of another type with the same process. Select the data first and then press ALT+H+B+T Keys simultaneously. We will see that data is framed with Thick Borders, as shown in the below screenshot.

Pros of Print Borders in Excel

• Creating the border around the desired data table makes data presentable to anyone.
• Border frame in any data set is quite useful when printing the data or pasting the data in any other file. By this, we make the data look perfectly covered.

Things to Remember

• Borders can be used with the shortcut key Alt + H + B, which will directly take us to the Border option.
• Giving a border in any data table is very important. We must provide the border after every work so that the data set can be bound.
• Always make proper alignment so that once we frame the data with a border and use it in different sources, the column width will be automatically set.

Recommended Articles

This has been a guide to Borders in Excel. Here we discussed how to add Borders in Excel and use shortcuts for borders in Excel along with practical examples and a downloadable excel template. You can also go through our other suggested articles –

1. LEFT Formula in Excel
2. VBA Borders
3. Format Cells in Excel
4. Print Gridlines in Excel