Written by Allen Wyatt (last updated April 30, 2022)
This tip applies to Excel 97, 2000, 2002, and 2003
Let's say you have a list of company transactions. Each transaction includes a department number, a title, and other information (amount, date, time, sales rep, etc.). As you get more and more of these items in your list, you may want a way to automatically add "dividing lines" based on the department number. For instance, when the department number changes, you may want to include a line between the two departments.
To add this type of formatting to your list, start by sorting your data table by department. Then follow these steps:
Figure 1. The Conditional Formatting dialog box.
Figure 2. The Borders tab of the Format Cells dialog box.
That's it; you should now see a line that appears across the entire width of your data every time the department changes.
ExcelTips is your source for cost-effective Microsoft Excel training. This tip (3189) 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: Automatic Lines for Dividing Lists.
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