Please Note: This article is written for users of the following Microsoft Excel versions: 2007, 2010, 2013, 2016, 2019, and 2021. If you are using an earlier version (Excel 2003 or earlier), this tip may not work for you. For a version of this tip written specifically for earlier versions of Excel, click here: Turning Off Automatic Capitalization.

Turning Off Automatic Capitalization

Written by Allen Wyatt (last updated May 1, 2021)
This tip applies to Excel 2007, 2010, 2013, 2016, 2019, and 2021

1

As you busily enter data into a worksheet, you may have noticed that periodically Excel will second-guess what you are doing and capitalize words for you. In general, Excel does this when it thinks you are starting a new sentence. (And, it assumes that the beginning of a cell is always the beginning of a sentence.)

If you find yourself undoing Excel's decisions on this issue quite a bit, you can turn off the feature completely by following these steps:

  1. Display the Excel Options dialog box. (In Excel 2007 click the Office button and then click Excel Options. In Excel 2010 and later versions display the File tab of the ribbon and then click Options.)
  2. Click Proofing at the left side of the dialog box.
  3. Click AutoCorrect Options. Excel displays the AutoCorrect dialog box.
  4. Make sure the AutoCorrect tab is displayed. (See Figure 1.)

    5. Figure 1. The AutoCorrect tab of the AutoCorrect dialog box.

  5. Clear the Capitalize First Letter of Sentences check box.
  6. Click on OK.

ExcelTips is your source for cost-effective Microsoft Excel training. This tip (6208) applies to Microsoft Excel 2007, 2010, 2013, 2016, 2019, and 2021. You can find a version of this tip for the older menu interface of Excel here: Turning Off Automatic Capitalization.

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

Maintaining Formatting when Inserting Documents

Word allows you to easily insert the contents of one document into another. Doing so, however, may result in unintended ...

Discover More

Printing Only Non-Blank Worksheets

If you have a workbook containing many worksheets, you might want to print only those worksheets that have some sort of ...

Discover More

Setting the Distance between Text and Borders

Add a border around a piece of text (such as a paragraph), and Word makes some assumptions about the placement of that ...

Discover More

Program Successfully in Excel! This guide will provide you with all the information you need to automate any task in Excel and save time and effort. Learn how to extend Excel's functionality with VBA to create solutions not possible with the standard features. Includes latest information for Excel 2024 and Microsoft 365. Check out Mastering Excel VBA Programming today!

More ExcelTips (ribbon)

Increasing the Capacity of AutoCorrect

AutoCorrect can be a great tool to, well, "correct" information that you type. If you get a little creative, you can even ...

Discover More

Using AutoCorrect

The AutoCorrect feature in Excel is a great tool for quickly entering information. Here's an explanation of the feature ...

Discover More

Automatically Capitalizing Day Names

When you enter a day name into a cell, Excel automatically capitalizes it. If you want to modify this behavior, follow ...

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 5 - 3?

2021-05-01 16:10:03

Tomek

in my version of Excel (MS365 Family) first letter in a cell is not capitalized; however if I have a period, exclamation mark, etc. within a cell than the first letter of the next word will be automatically capitalized. I am not complaining, actually I think this works better for me, but i just wanted to share my experience.

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 © 2025 Sharon Parq Associates, Inc.