The format painter is also helpful when copying conditional formats, although it also copies other formatting such as border line width, etc etc.
However, I am stuck on a conditional formatting problem in a large spreadsheet. I want to copy one but not all of the conditional formatting rules from cell A13 to cell B14, and one but not all of the conditional formatting rules from cell C13 to cell B14.. Is this possible; it would be great if I could just click on the rule I want and copy it?? At the moment i have a dummy cell set up for each rule, each cell has only one rule, and I successively copy each conditional format to the target cell. Clunky.. Any better ideas?
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Copying Conditional Formatting
Please Note: This article is written for users of the following Microsoft Excel versions: 97, 2000, 2002, and 2003. If you are using a later version (Excel 2007 or later), this tip may not work for you. For a version of this tip written specifically for later versions of Excel, click here: Copying Conditional Formatting.
In Excel, conditional formatting is considered part of the regular formatting of a cell. If you want to copy conditional formatting from one cell to another, you can do so by simply copying the cell and pasting it (or its format) to another cell. If you want to copy a conditional format to a range of cells (and only the conditional format), the easiest way to do so is by following these general steps:
- Select the range to which you want the conditional format copied. Make sure, however, that the cell whose conditional format you want copied is part of the range.
- Choose Conditional Format from the Format menu. You will see the Conditional Format dialog box. The format should already be filled in. (See Figure 1.)
- Click your mouse on OK.
Figure 1. The Conditional Formatting dialog box.
That's it. Excel does the rest and copies the conditional formatting, as you desired.
ExcelTips is your source for cost-effective Microsoft Excel training. This tip (2797) applies to Microsoft Excel 97, 2000, 2002, and 2003. You can find a version of this tip for the ribbon interface of Excel (Excel 2007 and later) here: Copying Conditional Formatting.
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Comments for this tip:
Teresa C 11 Feb 2014, 12:30
speedyjim 31 May 2012, 14:30
Brian D,
I ran into the same difficulty you were having with formulas used in CF not updating the relative references when copying. One way around that is to highlight the all the cells you want CF to apply to. You then open the CF dialog and type in your formula with the relative cell reference and click OK. The formulas then automatically adjust. I'm using Excel 2003. I hope this helps.
I ran into the same difficulty you were having with formulas used in CF not updating the relative references when copying. One way around that is to highlight the all the cells you want CF to apply to. You then open the CF dialog and type in your formula with the relative cell reference and click OK. The formulas then automatically adjust. I'm using Excel 2003. I hope this helps.
trafa 21 May 2012, 01:34
i study excel so i want know about excel a lot .
Brian Deno 26 Mar 2012, 20:58
Thanks,
This appears to work for everything but copying a CF that includes a formula referencing multiple cells. Do you have a suggestion on how to copy CF that includes a formula referencing multiple cells? Every method I've tried carries the original cells formula and does not modify the formula to reference the current row. Manually typing in each CF formula won't be fun.
Brian
This appears to work for everything but copying a CF that includes a formula referencing multiple cells. Do you have a suggestion on how to copy CF that includes a formula referencing multiple cells? Every method I've tried carries the original cells formula and does not modify the formula to reference the current row. Manually typing in each CF formula won't be fun.
Brian