Referencing External Cell Colors

Beth asked how to copy the color formatting of an external cell to a cell in the current workbook. Unfortunately, there is no intrinsic way to do this by using the linking features of Excel. You can, however, copy formatting from one workbook to another by using a macro.

As an example, consider the following macro code:

Dim lMyColor As Long
Workbooks.Open Filename:="C:\mypath\myworkbook.xlsm"
lMyColor = Range("A1").Interior.Color
Windows("TargetBook.xlsm").Activate
Range("E8").Interior.Color = lMyColor

This code opens a workbook (myworkbook.xlsm) and grabs the fill color from cell A1. It then switches back to the target workbook (from which this code is assumed to be running) and stuffs the fill color into cell E8.

This approach works great if you are copying the fill color from a single cell to a single cell. If you, instead, want to copy a range of cells or copy more formatting than just the fill color, then you might be better served with this approach:

Workbooks.Open Filename:= "C:\mypath\myworkbook.xlsm"
Range("A1:B6").Copy
Windows("TargetBook.xlsm").Activate
Range("E8").PasteSpecial Paste:=xlPasteFormats, _
  Operation:=xlNone, SkipBlanks:=False, _
  Transpose:=False

Again, this code opens the external workbook. It then uses the .Copy method for a range of cells (A1:B6). After switching to the target workbook, the formats from those cells are pasted into the cells beginning at E8.

If you decide to use code like this, you can place it in the Auto_Open macro for the target workbook. Of course, you need to modify the code so that it refers to the proper path and workbook names, along with the desired source and target ranges.

ExcelTips is your source for cost-effective Microsoft Excel training. This tip (11169) applies to Microsoft Excel 2007, 2010, 2013, 2016, 2019, and Excel in Office 365. You can find a version of this tip for the older menu interface of Excel here: Referencing External Cell Colors.