Please Note: This article is written for users of the following Microsoft Excel versions: 2007, 2010, 2013, and 2016. 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: Undoing an Edit.
It happens to the best of us. You may delete the wrong value, replace the wrong formula, or enter something incorrectly. In short, you make a mistake. Excel allows you to undo almost any of your editing actions. The easiest way to undo an edit or formatting change is to press Ctrl+Z. Excel very helpfully undoes whatever it was you just did.
Excel also provides an Undo tool at the upper-left of the Excel program window, just above the leftmost tabs of the ribbon. This tool looks like a curved arrow pointing backward—to the left. If you click on the tool, it is the same as pressing Ctrl+Z. If you click on the tool and you hear a "ding," it means there are no actions to undo. If there are more than one actions that can be undone, click on the down-arrow to the right of the Undo tool and you can see the various actions that you can undo.
ExcelTips is your source for cost-effective Microsoft Excel training. This tip (12361) applies to Microsoft Excel 2007, 2010, 2013, and 2016. You can find a version of this tip for the older menu interface of Excel here: Undoing an Edit.
Professional Development Guidance! Four world-class developers offer start-to-finish guidance for building powerful, robust, and secure applications with Excel. The authors show how to consistently make the right design decisions and make the most of Excel's powerful features. Check out Professional Excel Development today!
If you have added subtotals to your worksheet data, you might want to copy those subtotals somewhere else. This is easy ...
Discover MoreAt the very heart of editing is the ability to move and copy cells in a worksheet. Understanding the differences between ...
Discover MoreEnter information into a cell, and Excel needs to figure out what type of information it is. Here's how Excel interprets ...
Discover MoreFREE SERVICE: Get tips like this every week in ExcelTips, a free productivity newsletter. Enter your address and click "Subscribe."
2016-12-24 07:43:40
Petros
Undo provides a history of up-to 100 levels for a lot (but not all) of actions users perform in Excel. For example, running a macro or deleting a sheet resets the undo stack.
Undo steps must be executed in the reverse order they were first done. You can't, for example, jump through the list picking which steps you would like to undo and leave the rest. All the work between the last step and the step you want to undo, gets undone as well.
Here is how to modify Undo levels or disable Excel's Undo history. If the Undo history is disabled, no memory will be allocated for it. Excel can use the maximum memory available in your computer, when Undo levels are set to zero.
http://www.spreadsheet1.com/excel-options-addin.html
2016-12-24 06:05:19
Willy Vanhaelen
The use of Ctrl+Y (redo) is also interesting.
It cancels the effect of the Ctrl+Z you just pressed.
So, if you make a change to a worksheet and you want to compare the result before the change and after you can press Ctrl+Z and Ctrl+Y alternatively and keep the one you like.
2016-12-24 05:50:20
there is also a short key which is Ctrl+Y. that is used to undo the undo.
Please also mention this in your article.
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.
FREE SERVICE: Get tips like this every week in ExcelTips, a free productivity newsletter. Enter your address and click "Subscribe."
Copyright © 2019 Sharon Parq Associates, Inc.
Please Note:
This article is written for users of the following Microsoft Excel versions: 2007, 2010, 2013, and 2016. 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: 
Comments