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PUBLISHED ON: SEPTEMBER 2, 2022

How to Highlight Blanks or Errors in Microsoft Excel

When you choose colours that stand out on the screen, finding items in a spreadsheet may be accomplished considerably more quickly. Microsoft Excel's conditional formatting might help you detect empty cells and calculation problems more quickly.

How Automatically Highlight Blank Cells in Excel

When you have a spreadsheet with a lot of data that you anticipate filling every field, you may quickly skip over any blank cells. And incomplete data may be just as harmful as inaccurate data. then describes how to use conditional formatting to see blank cells.

1). You should open the sheet and choose the cells you wish to format. Click "Conditional format" in the Styles section of the ribbon's Home tab. Select "New rule."

highlight blank cells in excel

2). Choose New Rule under Conditional Formatting under the Home tab.

3). Select "Format only cells that include" in the New Formatting Rule box that displays. The rule kind is shown at the top.

highlight blank cells

4). Choose "Whites" from the drop-down box labelled "Format just cells with" at the bottom. After that, choose how to format empty cells by clicking "Format" to the right of the preview.

Highlight blank cells

5). Use the Source, Border, and Fill tabs at the top of the Format Cells box to choose your format. Select "OK." In this example, we'll utilise Fill to give our empty cells a vibrant yellow hue.

6). Returning to the New Formatting Rule box, you will get a preview of the format for the blank cells. Click "To Accept" to apply conditional formatting if you are OK with it.

highlight blank cells

After that, vacant cells in the range you specified should have the format you picked highlighted.

How to have Excel automatically indicate mistakes

Even while Microsoft Excel does a good job of screaming at you faults, if you have a big blade to move about with, they may not be obvious. Conditional formatting might come in handy to ensure that you can see mistakes right away.

In actuality, we'll utilise a slightly different variation of the method you used to highlight the gaps in the previous section.

1). Go to the Home tab, pick "New rule," then click "Conditional format."

highlight blank cells

2). Choose "Format only cells that include" from the top menu of the New Formatting Rule box. But this time, in the Format Cells Only drop-down box at the bottom, choose "Mistakes."

3). After that, pick the format by clicking "Format." To make cells with mistakes bold and red in this example, change the Font alternatives. After choosing a format, click "To Accept," and then click "To Accept" one again to apply the rule.



About the author:
Adarsh Kumar Singh is a technology writer with a passion for coding and programming. With years of experience in the technical field, he has established a reputation as a knowledgeable and insightful writer on a range of technical topics.