Finding Cells that Use Conditional Formatting

Written by Allen Wyatt (last updated May 11, 2026)

When you inherit a worksheet from someone, you may want to discover which cells have conditional formatting applied to them. This is rather easy to do using the Go To feature of Excel. Follow these steps:

  1. Press F5. Excel displays the Go To dialog box.
  2. Click Special. Excel displays the Go To Special dialog box. (See Figure 1.)

    3. Figure 1. The Go To Special dialog box.

  3. Select the Conditional Formats radio button.
  4. Click OK.

That's it. Excel selects all the cells in the current worksheet that have conditional formatting applied to them.

ExcelTips is your source for cost-effective Microsoft Excel training. This tip (6817) applies to Microsoft Excel 2007, 2010, 2013, 2016, 2019, 2021, and Excel in Microsoft 365.

Author Bio

Allen Wyatt

With more than 50 non-fiction books and numerous magazine articles to his credit, Allen Wyatt is an internationally recognized author. He is president of Sharon Parq Associates, a computer and publishing services company. ...

MORE FROM ALLEN

Changing the Number of Columns

If you need to change the number of columns used in a portion of your document, it's easy to do when you use the Columns ...

Discover More

Changing the Insertion Point Cursor

Want to change the characteristics of the insertion point used by Word? You may be out of luck, unless you make some ...

Discover More

Squaring Table Cells

Inserting a table is fast and easy in Word. You may want to make sure that the cells in the table are as square as ...

Discover More

Excel Smarts for Beginners! Featuring the friendly and trusted For Dummies style, this popular guide shows beginners how to get up and running with Excel while also helping more experienced users get comfortable with the newest features. Check out Excel 2019 For Dummies today!

More ExcelTips (ribbon)

Conditionally Making a Sound

Need to have a sound played if a certain condition is met? It is rather easy to do if you use a user-defined function to ...

Discover More

Conditionally Highlighting Cells Containing Formulas

Excel's conditional formatting feature allows you to create formats that are based on a wide variety of criteria. If you ...

Discover More

Highlighting an Entire Row for the Current Date

It is easy to apply conditional formatting to a cell. What if you want an entire row to be formatted, however, based on ...

Discover More
Subscribe

FREE SERVICE: Get tips like this every week in ExcelTips, a free productivity newsletter. Enter your address and click "Subscribe."

View most recent newsletter.

(Your e-mail address is not shared with anyone, ever.)

Comments

If you would like to add an image to your comment (not an avatar, but an image to help in making the point of your comment), include the characters [{fig}] (all 7 characters, in the sequence shown) in your comment text. You’ll be prompted to upload your image when you submit the comment. Maximum image size is 6Mpixels. Images larger than 600px wide or 1000px tall will be reduced. Up to three images may be included in a comment. All images are subject to review. Commenting privileges may be curtailed if inappropriate images are posted.

What is three more than 4?

There are currently no comments for this tip. (Be the first to leave your comment—just use the simple form above!)

This Site

Got a version of Excel that uses the ribbon interface (Excel 2007 or later)? This site is for you! If you use an earlier version of Excel, visit our ExcelTips site focusing on the menu interface.

Newest Tips
Subscribe

FREE SERVICE: Get tips like this every week in ExcelTips, a free productivity newsletter. Enter your address and click "Subscribe."

(Your e-mail address is not shared with anyone, ever.)

View the most recent newsletter.

Links and Sharing
OUR COMPANY
OUR PRODUCTS
OUR SITES
 

Copyright © 2026 Sharon Parq Associates, Inc.