Changing an Existing Style

Written by Allen Wyatt (last updated October 12, 2024)
This tip applies to Excel 97, 2000, 2002, and 2003


One of the great things about styles is that you can change them to suit the needs of the workbook you are developing. You can easily change an existing style in Excel by following these steps:

  1. Choose Style from the Format menu. You will see the Style dialog box. (See Figure 1.)
  2. Figure 1. The Style dialog box.

  3. Use the Style Name pull-down list to select the style you want to modify.
  4. Click on the Modify button. This displays the Format Cells dialog box. (See Figure 2.)
  5. Figure 2. The Format Cells dialog box.

  6. Using the controls in the dialog box, make any changes to the cell formatting desired.
  7. Click on OK to close the Format Cells dialog box. The Style dialog box remains displayed.
  8. Adjust the check box selections in the balance of the dialog box to indicate which specific attributes should be saved with your style.
  9. Click on Add to actually save your changes to the style.
  10. Repeat steps 2 through 7 to change any additional styles.
  11. Click on OK to close the Style dialog box.

ExcelTips is your source for cost-effective Microsoft Excel training. This tip (2682) 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. ...

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