Setting Text Attributes

by Allen Wyatt
(last updated June 4, 2016)

The term text attributes refers to how a particular font is presented. For instance, you might use the bold attribute to emphasize your text, or italics might be used to indicate a term being defined (as in the first sentence of this paragraph). Excel refers to these text attributes as font styles. The most common text attributes can be easily applied with a few of the tools available on the Formatting toolbar. There are three text attribute tools provided Bold, Italic, and Underline.

There are other types of text attributes available in Excel, but these cannot be applied from the Formatting toolbar. (At least, not without customizing the toolbar.) Instead you must use the full cell formatting features of Excel. This is done by using the menus, following these steps:

  1. Select the cell (or information within a cell) whose attributes you want to change.
  2. Choose the Cells option from the Format menu. Excel displays the Cells dialog box.
  3. Make sure the Font tab is selected. (See Figure 1.)

    4. Figure 1. The Font tab of the Cells dialog box.

  4. Use the Font Style control to indicate whether the text should be regular, bold, italics, or bold italics.
  5. Use the Underline control to specify any underlining of the text.
  6. Use the check boxes in the Effects area to set any additional attributes.
  7. Click on OK.

ExcelTips is your source for cost-effective Microsoft Excel training. This tip (2675) applies to Microsoft Excel 97, 2000, 2002, and 2003.

Author Bio

Allen Wyatt

With more than 50 non-fiction books and numerous magazine articles to his credit, Allen Wyatt is an internationally recognized author. He is president of Sharon Parq Associates, a computer and publishing services company. ...

MORE FROM ALLEN

Creating a Command List

Want a list of all the commands available in Word? You can get one easily by following these steps.

Discover More

Toggling AutoFilter

Want a tool that will help you toggle AutoFilter on and off? Excel provides some tools you can use, but you need to be ...

Discover More

Controlling the Behavior of the Mouse Wheel

The mouse wheel, by default, controls scrolling vertically through your worksheet. If you don't want the wheel to control ...

Discover More

Professional Development Guidance! Four world-class developers offer start-to-finish guidance for building powerful, robust, and secure applications with Excel. The authors show how to consistently make the right design decisions and make the most of Excel's powerful features. Check out Professional Excel Development today!

More ExcelTips (menu)

Converting From Numbers to Text

If you have a range of numeric values in your worksheet, you may want to change them from numbers to text values. Here's ...

Discover More

Unable to Format Cells

If you ever get to a situation where you can no longer format cells in a workbook, you'll realize just how important the ...

Discover More

Merge and Center Not Available

What are you to do if you are trying to format a worksheet, only to find out that one of the tools you need is not ...

Discover More
Subscribe

FREE SERVICE: Get tips like this every week in ExcelTips, a free productivity newsletter. Enter your address and click "Subscribe."

View most recent newsletter.

(Your e-mail address is not shared with anyone, ever.)

Comments

If you would like to add an image to your comment (not an avatar, but an image to help in making the point of your comment), include the characters [{fig}] in your comment text. You’ll be prompted to upload your image when you submit the comment. Maximum image size is 6Mpixels. Images larger than 600px wide or 1000px tall will be reduced. Up to three images may be included in a comment. All images are subject to review. Commenting privileges may be curtailed if inappropriate images are posted.

What is 9 - 6?

There are currently no comments for this tip. (Be the first to leave your comment—just use the simple form above!)

This Site

Got a version of Excel that uses the menu interface (Excel 97, Excel 2000, Excel 2002, or Excel 2003)? This site is for you! If you use a later version of Excel, visit our ExcelTips site focusing on the ribbon interface.

Newest Tips
Subscribe

FREE SERVICE: Get tips like this every week in ExcelTips, a free productivity newsletter. Enter your address and click "Subscribe."

(Your e-mail address is not shared with anyone, ever.)

View the most recent newsletter.

Links and Sharing
OUR COMPANY
OUR PRODUCTS
OUR AUTHORS
OUR SITES
 

Copyright © 2019 Sharon Parq Associates, Inc.