How To Create A Dropdown List In Excel For Mac

© Images: Microsoft

  1. See More Results
  2. See Full List On Wikihow.com
  3. Cached
  4. Flash Fill For Mac?
  5. How To Create A Dropdown List In Excel For Mac Os

Drop down list and Conditional formatting tools are very useful in Excel 2016, to view your data in a particular format manner. You can create a dropdown list in google sheets using the same method. You can create a dropdown list in google sheets using the same method. Easily create drop-down list with checkboxes in Excel: The Drop-down List with Check Boxes utility of Kutools for Excel can help you easily create drop-down list with checkboxes in a specified range, current worksheet, current workbook or all opened workbooks based on your needs. Download and try it now! ( 30-day free trail).

Video: How to add a drop down list to a cell in Microsoft Excel
Excel

An Excel drop down list or dropdown menu can make it easier for the average Microsoft Excel user to enter data on a worksheet or workbook. Using a drop down menu in web forms, surveys, or polls can limit the entry choices for a selected cell, speeding data entry and reducing data entry error. In this Excel tip, we'll show you a quick and easy way to create a dropdown list or drop down menu using the spreadsheet application's Data Validation feature.

You need only two things: A list and a data entry cell. Figure A shows a simple drop down list in an Excel sheet. You can work with your own data or download the demonstration .xlsx and .xls files.

How To Create A Dropdown List In Excel For Mac

Figure A

See More Results

© Provided by TechRepublic

To add the drop down list in our example to an Excel sheet, do the following:

  1. Create the data validation list in cells A1:A4. Similarly, you can enter the items in a single row, such as A1:D1.
  2. Select cell E4. (You can position the drop down list in most any cell or even multiple cells.)
  3. Choose Data Validation from the Data ribbon menu.
  4. Choose List from the Allow option's drop down list. (See, they're everywhere.)
  5. Click the Source control box and drag the cursor to highlight the cells A1:A4. Alternately, simply enter the reference (=$A$1:$A$4).
  6. Make sure the In-cell dropdown option is checked. If you uncheck this option, Excel still forces users to enter only list values (A1:A4), but it won't present a drop down list.
  7. Click OK.

SEE: How to create a drop-down list in Google Sheets (TechRepublic)

You can add the drop down list to multiple Excel cells. Select the range of data input cells (step 2) instead of a single Excel cell. It even works for noncontiguous Excel cells. Hold down the Shift key while you click the appropriate Excel cells.

A few quick notes:

  • You can only see the drop down box if you click on the Excel cell used for data entry.
  • Your users can now only choose one of the options in the drop down. If they try to enter their own data, then they'll receive an error message.
  • You can copy-and-paste this drop down cell to any other Excel cells in your spreadsheet, and you can create as many different drop downs like this as you'd like.

SEE: 10 Excel time-savers you might not know about (free PDF) (TechRepublic)

A Microsoft Excel bonus tip

This Excel tip is featured in the free PDF 30 things you should never do in Microsoft Office.

Rely on multiple links

Links between two Excel workbooks are common and useful. But multiple links where values in workbook1 depend on values in workbook2, which links to workbook3, and so on, are hard to manage and unstable. Users forget to close files, and sometimes they even move them. If you're the only person working with those linked Excel workbooks, you might not run into trouble, but if other users are reviewing and modifying them, you're asking for trouble. If you truly need that much linking, you might consider a new design.

Get more Excel tips

Read 56 Excel tips every user should master and the tutorials on how to add a condition to a drop down list in Excel, how to add color to a drop down list in Excel, how to create an Excel drop down list from another tab, how to change an Excel conditional formatting on the fly and how to combine Excel's VLOOKUP() function with a combo box for enhanced searching. Also, check out this free PDF download: 13 handy Excel data entry shortcuts.

With the help of the drop-down list in MS Excel, you can greatly facilitate data entry. A drop-down list is really helpful when it comes to restricting the number of choices for a selection in web forms, polls, and surveys. Creating a drop-down list is possible in MS Excel spreadsheet. By doing this you can restrict a user from entering any other value and thus, force him/her to choose a value from the list given there.

See Full List On Wikihow.com

However, the process to create a drop-down list may not be clear to many of the users. If you are one of them then we have got your back. To help you out we have listed the detailed steps to create a drop-down list in MS Excel.

How to create drop down list in excel 2016 mac

Cached

How

Steps To Create a Drop-Down List In MS Excel

A drop-down list allows you to select a choice from a given list without you having to type it out. All you have to do is follow the steps given below and you will be all ready with your drop-down list within no time. Here you go with the steps.

  1. First of all, open MS Excel on your computer or laptop. Well, that’s a very obvious thing to do!
  2. Now write down the list somewhere in the spreadsheet. It is advised that you write the list in alphabetically in ascending order as shown in the picture below.
  3. In this step, you have to select the entire list and give a name to it. You have to write its name in the box as shown in the picture below.
  4. The next step is to select the cell in which you want to add the drop-down list. Like for instance, in the picture, we have selected the cell B2. Similarly, you can choose any other cell that you want.
  5. Now go to the option ‘Data’ that you will notice at the top of the page.
  6. Next, go to the ‘Data validation’ button. It may appear as two of the following.

OR

Flash Fill For Mac?

  1. Once you click on the said option a dialog box will appear on your screen. What you have to do here is click on the ‘Any Value’ and then choose the list.
  2. The next thing that you have to do is enter the name of the list that you have given in the box named as ‘Source.’
  3. Once you are done click on the ‘OK’ button.

There, you have your drop-down list ready. Thus, you can see that creating a drop-down list in MS Excel is no big deal if you know the steps correctly. Now that you are familiar with the steps you can prepare as many drop-down lists you want by following the same steps given above. It is really easy and anybody can do it. All this is important for you to learn especially if you work in an office because you never know when your boss asks you to prepare one such drop-down list.

How To Create A Dropdown List In Excel For Mac Os

Other Related Posts