Excel: How to fix/lock background color in a sheet
When working collaboratively in Excel, it can be important to maintain visual consistency and prevent inadvertent changes to cell formatting—especially background colors used for highlighting, instructions, or organizational purposes. If you share a workbook for others to edit, you might want to prevent users from modifying certain cell colors to preserve your formatting standard. The key is to secure cell formats before distributing or sharing the sheet.
Fix background color in a sheet
Fix background color in a sheet
In order to lock the background color in specific cells and prevent others from altering it, you need to use the sheet protection feature in Excel. This process involves setting the protection attributes of your target cells and configuring the worksheet so that formatting cannot be changed by others. This technique is widely used, for example, when distributing budget templates, progress tracking sheets, or work order forms, where colored highlights indicate important actions or statuses.
1. Start by confirming that the cells whose background color you want to secure are set to "Locked" (the default state) before you enable sheet protection. Select your target cell range, right-click, and choose Format Cells from the context menu.
2. In the Format Cells dialog box, go to the Protection tab. Make sure the Locked checkbox is checked—this is enabled by default for all cells in a new worksheet. Click OK to confirm. 
3. Next, navigate to the Review tab, and select Protect Sheet. This will launch the sheet protection setup.
4. In the Protect Sheet dialog, you should enter a password to restrict access to unprotecting the sheet (optional but recommended for stronger protection). Carefully uncheck the Format cells option (click the checkbox so it is not selected), which ensures others cannot change cell formatting, including background color—even if they try to use the ribbon or right-click menus. Click OK to apply protection.
5. In the Confirm Password dialog, retype your password exactly as before, then click OK. Make sure to record your password somewhere secure, because you’ll need it to remove protection later.
At this point, the worksheet's formatting is protected. Neither the cell backgrounds nor other formats (such as font or border settings) can be changed unless the sheet is unprotected again using the password. If a user attempts to change the cell format, Excel will prompt them that the sheet is protected and block the change.
Tip: If you need to fix and lock background colors on several sheets at once—for example, in a workbook with multiple closely-related tabs—it can be time-consuming to repeat protection for each sheet manually. Kutools for Excel provides a Protect Worksheets feature that lets you protect multiple sheets together in one action, streamlining the process. This can greatly reduce the chance of forgetting to protect a sheet, and is especially useful for administrative reports, large templates, or teaching materials where consistency matters.
Advantages: Using sheet protection is straightforward and integrates seamlessly with Excel’s built-in features. It is effective for most everyday management situations. Kutools for Excel extends this by providing faster operations for batch protection and additional usability.
Disadvantages/Precautions: If you forget your password, you will not be able to unprotect the sheet to make formatting changes. It’s also important to note that this method protects formatting only—users can still enter or change data unless you also restrict "Select unlocked cells" or related options.
Troubleshooting: If formatting can still be changed after protection, check that the "Format cells" item was properly unchecked, and confirm the target cells remain locked in their Format Cells dialog.
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