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How to highlight active cell or selection in Excel?

If you have a large worksheet, maybe it is hard for you to find out the active cell or active selection at a glance. But, if the active cell/section has an outstanding color, to find out it will not be a problem. In this article, I will talk about how to automatically highlight the active cell or selected range of cells in Excel.

Highlight active cell or selection with VBA code

arrow blue right bubble Highlight active cell or selection with VBA code

The following VBA code can help you to highlight the active cell or a selection dynamically, please do as follows:

1. Hold down the ALT + F11 keys to open the Microsoft Visual Basic for Applications window.

2. Then choose ThisWorkbook from the left Project Explorer, double click it to open the Module, and then copy and paste following VBA code into the blank Module:

VBA code: Highlight active cell or selection

Sub Workbook_SheetSelectionChange(ByVal Sh As Object, ByVal Target As Excel.Range)
'Update 20140923
Static xLastRng As Range
On Error Resume Next
Target.Interior.ColorIndex = 6
xLastRng.Interior.ColorIndex = xlColorIndexNone
Set xLastRng = Target
End Sub

doc-highlight-active-cell-1

3. Then save and close this code, and go back to the worksheet, now, when you select a cell or a selection, the selected cells will be highlighted, and it will be dynamically moved as the selected cells changes.

Notes:

1. If you cannot find the Project Explorer Pane in the window, you can click View > Project Explorer in the Microsoft Visual Basic for Applications window to open it.

2. In the above code, you can change .ColorIndex = 6 color to other color you like.

3. This VBA code can be applied to all worksheets within the workbook.

4. If there are some colored cells in your worksheet, the color will be lost when you click the cell and then move to other cell.

Related article:

How to auto-highlight row and column of active cell in Excel?

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Comments (16)
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Ergun
Ergun
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I had the same problem, read the whole page and comments. While thinking to apply it or not, I was just randomly clicking on number and letters to select the whole column and rows. Then suddenly highlight of selected cell feature came back :)
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Luis Lopes
Luis Lopes
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Hello, if someone can help me... I pick up this code in internet (apologies to the owner). It does almost what i need but this code select the entirerow. What i need is a change that alow to select just the first two cells of the row of the activecells. When i click in the cell, i need that the cell of the column "$I16" and "$J16" (16 is the first line of my table) of that row became interior color (=9359529). The code is this: 
Dim lTarget As Range

Private Sub Worksheet_SelectionChange(ByVal Target As Range)

If Target.Row >= 16 Then

If Not lTarget Is Nothing Then

lTarget.EntireRow.Interior.ColorIndex = 0
End If

Target.EntireRow.Interior.Color = 9359529

Set lTarget = Target
End If
End Sub

Can you help me? I had try to change this code but the only thing i can as the select the interior color of the cell target and not the column "$I" and "$J" in that specific row.Thank you for your help.
Luis Lopes
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Eric Nur
Eric Nur
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I know that you proposed a solution but the solution comes with another problem as you described below: "The only problem with having this code active is that you can no longer change the active cell color as it changes back to what it was before you clicked it. I suggest that if you need to change the highlight colors on the sheet, do so with macros disabled or change the sub name for a second so it doesn't trigger when you are clicking on cells". This is not an acceptable alternative for me. I need to be able to change the colors in the cells when the macro is active. Do you have a solution for this this problem. If you come up with a solution for this problem please republish your corrected macro the new macro in full (rather than proposing patches to your original macro because I am technically challenged as far as macro are concerned).
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Eric Nur
Eric Nur
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I tried your macro by copying and pasting it into my Excel file. I did change one thing in the macro though. I changed the color index from 6 to 24 (to a color different than the colors I am currently using in my macro). It worked very nicely and I liked it a lot but then started causing a problem for me. I have a lot of cells filled with with colors in my Excel. The macro started removing the color fill from every cell touched. I don't know how to stop the macro's this odd behavior. I did not have any choice but to remove the macro from my file. I still like to use this macro if someone can help me to fix it.
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Ben
Ben
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That was super helpful, thank you.
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pyroto
pyroto
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Anyway you can do the left adjacent cell to highlight instead of active cell? Or a range of cells around the activecell?
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Joa
Joa
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Thank you, but use this with caution. It has the undesirable counter effect of not letting undo. Is there any solution for that?
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Sud
Sud
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But i am unable to do undo option and lose the previously assigned cell color also.
Please provide solution
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Pravin Shinde
Pravin Shinde
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Perfect solution as I always tend to loose the track of the highlighted cell during "Find and Select" operation. Thanks a lot.
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Rana Banik
Rana Banik
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Great!! But what if I don't want to lose the previously assigned cell color? That would be greater to know.
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Barney
Barney     Rana Banik
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Use a conditional format on the cells you want to protect.
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markjmjanderson@gmail.com
    Rana Banik
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Instead of "ColorIndex" which has a limited set of 255 values (meaning any custom colors are lost), use "Color" instead. You'll need to store the old value in a new static long variable and also generate the highlight color you want with the RGB function. The only problem with having this code active is that you can no longer change the active cell color as it changes back to what it was before you clicked it. I suggest that if you need to change the highlight colors on the sheet, do so with macros disabled or change the sub name for a second so it doesn't trigger when you are clicking on cells, then just rename it back to normal to "re-activate" it. Here is my code:

Sub Workbook_SheetSelectionChange(ByVal Sh As Object, ByVal Target As Excel.Range)

Static xLastRng As Range
Static xLastRngColor As Long

On Error Resume Next

xLastRng.Interior.Color = xLastRngColor
xLastRngColor = Target.Interior.Color
Target.Interior.Color = RGB(255, 255, 0) 'compose whatever highlight color you want with RGB values, I am using yellow here
Set xLastRng = Target

End Sub
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ibnu
ibnu    
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work.... great...
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Lee
Lee     Rana Banik
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Yes, I would like to know this as well. How would you keep the previously selected cells highlight for tracking purposes?
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markjmjanderson@gmail.com
    Lee
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See my comment above.
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