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How to get the address of active cell in Excel?

While using the Microsoft Excel, you can easily get the location of currently selected cell in the Name Box which lists on the left of the Formula Bar. But if the cell is named, you can’t examine its location based on the displaying on the Name Box. And if you want to directly show the full address of the active cell, or display the address of active cell in a specified cell, what would you do? In this tutorial, we will show you how to easily get the address of the active cell with formula and VBA methods.

Get address of active cell with Formula

Get address of active cell with VBA code

Display the address of active cell in a specified cell with VBA code

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Get address of active cell with Formula

In this section, we will provide you a formula of easily getting the address of active cell.

1. Select a cell to make it active.

2. Copy and paste the formula =ADDRESS(ROW(),COLUMN()) into the cell and then press the Enter key.

Then you can see the address of the active cell is displaying in the cell immediately.

Get address of active cell with VBA code

You can also get the address of active cell with VBA code. Please do as follows.

1. Press the Alt + F11 simultaneously to open the Microsoft Visual Basic for Applications window.

2. In the Microsoft Visual Basic for Applications window, double click the name of current using worksheet in the left pane to open the Code editor, then copy and paste the below VBA code into the Code editor.

VBA code: Get address of active cell

Sub selectRange()
	MsgBox ActiveCell.Address
End Sub

3. Then click the Run button to run the code.

4. Then a dialog box will pop up with the address of the active cell listed inside.

Display the address of active cell in a specified cell with VBA code

In another situation, you would like the address of active cell be displayed in a specified cell. Every time when you move from one cell to another, the cell address will be automatically changed and displayed in the specified cell. Please do as follows.

1. Please open the Microsoft Visual Basic for Applications window by pressing Alt + F11 at the same time.

2. Double click the sheet name in the left pane to open the code editor, then copy and paste the below code into it.

VBA code: display the address of active cell in a specified cell

Private Sub Worksheet_SelectionChange(ByVal Target As Range)
	Range("A1").Value = ActiveCell.Address
End Sub

Note: A1 is the cell where you want to put the active cell address, you can change it to the specified cell for your own needs.

3. Then click File > Close and Return to Microsoft Excel to exit the Microsoft Visual Basic for Applications window.

You can see the address of active cell displays on the cell A1, and the address will change automatically based on the changing of the active cell. See screenshot:

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  • To post as a guest, your comment is unpublished.
    RichEO · 6 months ago
    The first example does not display the address of the active cell but of the cell containing the formula. If you were to select a different cell the address would not change.
    Actually this is probably more useful information than gathering the active cell's address and harder to find if you need it. I was looking how to do this using VBA and could not find it for a while so I will include it here:

    Application.Caller.Address

    That will give you the address of the cell calling the function and not the active cell, useful for relative references.
  • To post as a guest, your comment is unpublished.
    Bill Schipper · 2 years ago
    Hello,

    Displaying the active cell reference is helpful. But how do I actually use that value? I'm reading exams, and have six columns (of which two will get filled in). The student name is in column A; I can extract the family name: LEFT(A7,(FIND(",")A7)-1))) [where A7 is the current address]. I can use the code for displaying the current active cell address provided above:

    Private Sub Worksheet_SelectionChange(ByVal Target As Range)
    Range("A1").Value = ActiveCell.Address
    End Sub

    But what I really want to do is have the cursor being somewhere in the current row (C3:H3), and extract the family name of the current student. Example:

    A B C D E F G H
    1 Name ID 1 2 3 4 5 6

    2 Smith, John 1234567

    When the active cell is between C1 and H1, I want to extract the student name from A2 ("Smith, John") [using LEFT(A2,(FIND(",")A2)-1)))], but with the values for the address supplied from the code above.

    Any suggestions would be welcome.


    Bill
    • To post as a guest, your comment is unpublished.
      crystal · 2 years ago
      Dear Bill,
      If you want to use the cell reference of active cell, please apply below VBA code.
      (The active cell reference will be displayed in cell A1. Then you can copy the cell reference directely in A1 or do other operations as you need.)

      Private Sub Worksheet_SelectionChange(ByVal Target As Range)
      On Error Resume Next
      If (Target.Count = 1) And (Intersect(Target, Range("A1")) Is Nothing) Then
      Range("A1").Value = ActiveCell.Address
      End If
      End Sub
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