How to Use Focus Cell to Aid Data Entry and Analysis in Excel

Excel's focus cell function: a convenient tool for improving efficiency

Excel's new focus cell function in recent years is simple, but very practical. It highlights the rows and columns of the active cell, helps you track where it is in the spreadsheet, and makes it easy for you to read the rows and columns data.

As of December 2024, this feature is only available for Microsoft 365 subscribers using Windows (version 2410, build 18118.20000 or later) and Mac (version 16.91, build 24109300 or later) . It is scheduled to be released on Excel on the web in March 2025.

How to enable focus cell

Before Microsoft adds focus cells to Excel, I often click on row numbers or column letters to make sure I'm reading or adding data to the correct cell. The focus cell function essentially does this for you while highlighting the rows and columns where the active cell resides.

This feature is disabled by default. So, to enable it, open the View tab on the ribbon and click Focus Cell in the Show group.

After clicking this button, the function will be immediately visible. Note that the active cell retains the cell's color (in my case, its default color), while the rest of the cells in the columns and rows take a boot color.

When this feature is enabled, it will remain active in any new workbook you create or open. You can click the same icon again to close it.

Focus cell does not print – it is a screen-only tool designed to help you navigate and organize.

How to change the focus cell color

By default, the focus cells highlight active rows and columns in turquoise. However, this can be confusing if you use green or blue text, cell fills, or borders. So you can change the focus cell color to the one you don't use very often in your spreadsheet.

Click the Focus Cell drop-down menu in the View tab and hover over the Focus Cell Color. Then, select a color from the displayed palette.

The color of the focus cell is a lighter tone of any color you choose so that you can still read the data in the colored cell. Here I chose red and you can see that the ribbon is pink.

How to add focus cells to the quick access toolbar

While the focus cell is very convenient for reading and modifying spreadsheets containing a lot of data, on smaller worksheets you may find it less necessary. So if you work with various sheets with different amounts of data, it is very convenient to be able to enable and disable focus cells right away, which is why you should add the tool to the Quick Access Toolbar (QAT).

To do this, right-click Focus Cell in the View tab on the ribbon and click Add to Quick Access Toolbar.

The focus cell icon will then appear at the top of the Excel window.

If it doesn't appear, it's because you don't enable QAT. To change this setting, right-click any tab on the ribbon and click Show Quick Access Toolbar.

Or, press Alt > W > E > F to activate and deactivate the focus cell from the keyboard.

How to use automatic highlighting of find and replace

If you use Excel's Find and Replacement Tools to identify values ​​in an intensive spreadsheet, it may sometimes be difficult to see which cell contains the value you are looking for. To resolve this issue, select the last option "Show Auto Highlight" in the Focus Cell drop-down menu.

After starting the Find (Ctrl F) and Find and Replace (Ctrl H) dialog box, type the value you want to search for in the Find Content field. Then, when you click Find Next, Excel uses the focus cell temporary format to emphasize cells that match your criteria. In my case, I want to see where Barry works on any day.

This tool is ideal if you don't want to use focus cells but want Excel to highlight relevant cells when using Find or Find and Replace. If you enable the focus cell, Excel applies this temporary format regardless of whether you check Show auto highlighting or not.

Precautions

Although this tool has many benefits, there are some things you should pay attention to before using it.

First, if you display two or more windows at the same time, Excel in one window, and another program in another window, the focus cell highlighting disappears as soon as you click to leave the Excel window . The same problem occurs if you use two or more Excel windows at the same time - the focus cells are only displayed in the active window. From the perspective of data entry, this is an inconvenient disadvantage.

Secondly, when changing the focus cell color, you can only choose from ten standard colors. Also, since there is no gray or black, there is no neutral focus cell color available.

Another way to ensure you accurately read and edit large spreadsheets is to use Excel's Freeze Pane tool, which keeps certain rows and columns on the screen when scrolling down and right. Using both the frozen pane and the focus cell ensures that you do not enter data into the wrong cell.

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