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: Viewing Comments.

Viewing Comments

Written by Allen Wyatt (last updated October 6, 2018)
This tip applies to Excel 97, 2000, 2002, and 2003

Excel allows you to add comments to the cells in your workbook. At some point you may want to view your comments. Simply follow these steps:

  1. Choose Options from the Tools menu. Excel displays the Options dialog box.
  2. Make sure the View tab is selected. (See Figure 1.)

    3. Figure 1. The View tab of the Options dialog box.

  3. Select from the three radio buttons in the Comments section of the dialog box. (The meanings of these settings are described shortly.)
  4. Click on OK to close the Options dialog box.

There are three possible settings for comments (see step 4). The three radio buttons are as follows:

  • None. This option is selected by default. You can't see any indication of comments in a workbook if this option is selected.
  • Comment Indicator Only. This option results in a small red triangle displayed in the upper-right corner of cells that have comments.
  • Comment & Indicator. With this option selected, the comment indicators (red triangles) still appear, but all the comments in your workbook are visible. If you have a lot of comments, then your screen can appear very cluttered very quickly.

ExcelTips is your source for cost-effective Microsoft Excel training. This tip (2856) 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: Viewing Comments.

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

Default Worksheet when Opening

When opening a workbook, you may want to make sure that a particular worksheet is always displayed first. The only way to ...

Discover More

Library Not Registered Error

There are lots of error messages that can pop up in Excel from time to time. One of the most confusing may be the ...

Discover More

Standard Text before a Sequence Number

When you use fields to number items within a document, you may want to add some standard text before each field. There ...

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)

Copying Comments to Cells

Need to copy whatever is in a comment into a cell on your worksheet? If you have lots of comments, manually doing this ...

Discover More

Printing Comments

Comments can be a boon when you want to annotate your worksheets. If you want, you can instruct Excel to print the ...

Discover More

Changing the Comment Color

Normally Excel displays comments in a color reminiscent of sticky notes you keep around your office. If you want them to ...

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}] (all 7 characters, in the sequence shown) 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 7 + 1?

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 SITES
 

Copyright © 2025 Sharon Parq Associates, Inc.