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How to shade a cell based on another cell value in Excel?

Author Siluvia Last modified

Supposing you want to shade a cell (says A1) with a certain background color if cell B4 meets the criteria such as has a certain value or the value is greater or less than a specific number. What would you do? This article will show you the method.

Shade a cell based on another cell value with Conditional Formatting

Shade a cell based on another cell value with Conditional Formatting

You can do as follows to shade a cell based on another cell value in Excel.

1. Select the cell (says A1) you want to shade based on another cell value, then click Conditional Formatting > New Rule under the Home tab.

click Conditional Formatting > New Rule under the Home tab

2. In the New Formatting Rule dialog box, you need to:

  • 2.1 Select Use a formula to determine which cells to format option in the Select a Rule Type box;
  • 2.2 If you want to shade cell A1 when value of B4 is greater than 500, then enter formula =$B4>500 into the Format values where this formula is true box;
    Tips: if you want to shade cell A1 when B4 has a certain value such as “test”, the use this formula =$B4=“test”. You can change the variable in the formula based on your needs.
  • 2.3 Click the Format button to specify a background color;
  • 2.4 Click the OK button when it returns to the New Formatting Rule dialog box. See screenshot:

set options in the New Formatting Rule dialog box

Then you can see the specified cell is shaded based on the value of another cell as below screenshot shown.

the specified cell is shaded based on the value of another cell

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