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: Specifying Superscript Text.

Specifying Superscript Text

Written by Allen Wyatt (last updated June 5, 2021)
This tip applies to Excel 2007, 2010, 2013, 2016, 2019, and 2021


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Excel supports a number of different text attributes that can be applied to the characters in your cells. One of those attributes is superscript, which makes affected text smaller and raises it above the baseline used by surrounding text. Superscript is very helpful to use for scientific formulas. To apply superscript in your text, follow these steps:

  1. Select the cell (or information within a cell) that you want to be superscript.
  2. Press Ctrl+Shift+F. Excel displays the Format Cells dialog box, with the Font tab selected. (See Figure 1.)
  3. Figure 1. The Font tab of the Format Cells dialog box.

  4. Select the Superscript check box.
  5. Click on OK.

ExcelTips is your source for cost-effective Microsoft Excel training. This tip (10034) 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: Specifying Superscript Text.

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. ...

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What is 5 + 3?

2021-06-08 18:07:19

Bob Williams

About superscripts -- I have discovered characters that look like superscripts but are actually not. There are only four of them: º (Alt-0186), ¹ (Alt-0185), ² (Alt-0178), and ³ (Alt-0179). I have an application where they come in handy, and I even can make multi-digit "superscripts" which are base-4 values! (How geeky is that!)


2021-06-07 07:53:44

Nick Kramer

There is an excellent form that enables individual characters to be formatted from http://www.vertex42.com/ExcelTips/excel-toolbar-buttons.html

Custom Cell Format UserForm

This macro requires that you first download the code for the form and then import it into VBA. Below is a screenshot of the form. It is especially useful for formatting text that involves symbol fonts, subscripts, italics, bold, etc. Note that you cannot delete or add characters within the form.

(see Figure 1 below)

Figure 1. User Form


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