Inside Excel's Conditional Formatting Feature

Author: David H. Ringstrom

In this course, author and Excel expert David H. Ringstrom, CPA, will guide you through the powerful features of Conditional Formatting in Microsoft Excel to enhance your data visualization skills. Attendees will learn how to apply various formatting techniques, including highlighting duplicates, using color scales, and creating data bars to represent values visually. David will cover essential topics such as formatting cells based on specific criteria like greater than or equal to a value, filtering conditionally formatted cells, and managing conditional formatting rules effectively. Whether you're looking to unlock input cells or simply make your data stand out, this course will equip you with practical tips and insights to elevate your Excel presentations.

David H. Ringstrom, CPA, has more than 30 years of experience as a spreadsheet and accounting software consultant and speaker. He has presented over 2,500 live webinars and is the author or co-author of ten books, including “Microsoft 365 Excel All-in-One for Dummies”, “Microsoft 365 Excel for Dummies”, “Exploring Microsoft Excel’s Hidden Treasures”, and “QuickBooks Online for Dummies”.

In his courses, David encourages questions throughout the presentation and demonstrates every technique twice: first on a PowerPoint slide with numbered steps and then live in Excel for Microsoft 365 for Windows. He highlights any differences in Excel 2024, 2021, or 2019 during the session and in his detailed handouts. Attendees also receive an Excel workbook containing most of the examples he uses, making it easy to follow along and apply the techniques later. David additionally supports Excel for Mac users by answering their follow-up questions via email.

Publication Date: June 2026

Designed For
Professionals seeking to enhance their data visualization skills, improve reporting accuracy, and streamline data analysis through advanced Excel techniques.

Topics Covered

• Applying color scales to highlight date ranges with Conditional Formatting
• Using Conditional Formatting's Greater Than rule to highlight text that starts with or follows certain letters
• Highlighting the lowest ten (or a specified number) of values in a column using Conditional Formatting
• Highlighting amounts greater than a specified value using Conditional Formatting
• Filtering data based on conditional formatting
• Removing no-longer-relevant filtered items using the Reapply command
• Most features and functions work in Excel for Mac as well but expect differences
• Creating instant heat maps with the Color Scales Conditional Formatting
• Formatting specific words within a column of text using Conditional Formatting
• Filtering data lists based on cell icons applied through Conditional Formatting
• Using Conditional Formatting to identify unlocked cells for data entry
• Identifying and highlighting duplicate entries in a list using Conditional Formatting

Learning Objectives

• Recall which keyboard shortcut undoes your last action in Excel
• Identify which command to select when right-clicking a cell to exclusively display cells that have been color-coded by Conditional Formatting
• Recognize the Conditional Formatting feature that enables you add varying shapes or symbols to worksheet cells
• Identify on which ribbon tab the Conditional Formatting command appears
• Identify the Conditional Formatting feature that adds visual indicators such as arrows or shapes to help compare cell values

Level
Basic

Instructional Method
Self-Study

NASBA Field of Study
Computer Software & Applications (2 hours)

Program Prerequisites
None

Advance Preparation
None