Basic Excel Categories:
Excel Data InputThis page introduces some of the Basic Excel skills that will help when you are using functions and formulas in Excel.
Many useful Excel basics are described in the links below, but if you are a complete beginner, you might also find some useful tips on the Microsoft Office Basic Excel page.
There are several different ways of entering data into a spreadsheet. Many of these methods are shortcuts that will help you to save time and therefore work more efficiently.
Click on the links below for details.
| EXCEL DATA INPUT |
| INSERT A NEW LINE IN AN EXCEL CELL |
| EXCEL AUTOFILL |
| INPUTTING EXCEL FUNCTIONS |
| EXCEL COPY AND PASTE |
| EXCEL FIND AND REPLACE |
| DATA VALIDATION: CREATE A DROP DOWN LIST |
| SPELL CHECK IN EXCEL |
It is worth spending a little time learning the Excel Keyboard Shortcuts for the actions that you perform most frequently in Excel. You will find that the time invested in learning these shortcuts will soon be repaid many times over.
| COMMON EXCEL KEYBOARD SHORTCUTS |
An understanding of absolute and relative cell references is essential when you are copying formulas between Excel cells. Click on the links below for details.
| EXCEL CELL REFERENCES |
| EXCEL REFERENCES STYLES |
| EXCEL NAMED RANGES |
Did you know that Excel stores Dates & Times as numbers? An understanding of how this works will help you to work much more effectively when using Dates & Times in Excel. Click the links below for more details:
| EXCEL DATES & TIMES |
| HOW TO SUBTRACT DATES IN EXCEL |
| HOW TO SUBTRACT TIME IN EXCEL |
In order to prevent problems, you may need to convert between the different Excel data types before using values in Excel functions and formulas.
| CONVERT TEXT TO A NUMBER |
| CONVERT A NUMBER TO TEXT |
| CONVERT TEXT TO A DATE |
| CONVERT A DATE TO TEXT |
Excel allows you to change the view of your spreadsheet by zooming in or out, showing formulas, etc. Some of the more popular options are explained in the following links.
| HOW TO FREEZE PANES IN EXCEL |
| EXCEL ZOOM |
| SHOW FORMULAS |
| HIDE & UNHIDE COLUMNS IN EXCEL |
| HIDE & UNHIDE ROWS IN EXCEL |
| HIDE GRIDLINES |
There is much more to Excel Formatting than just making spreadsheets look good.
In addition to making your spreadsheet look professional and smart, the formatting of data in Excel can also change the way the data is interpreted. The wrong formatting can sometimes result in data being read incorrectly and may give the impression that your function has failed to evaluate correctly. Click on the links below for more details.
| BASIC FORMATTING |
| EXCEL DATE FORMATTING |
| EXCEL CUSTOM NUMBER FORMATTING |
| MERGE CELLS |
| WRAP TEXT IN EXCEL |
| CONDITIONAL FORMATTING |
You can quickly and easily display subtotals in your data table using the built-in Excel subtotal command.
| EXCEL SUBTOTAL COMMAND |
The correct use of hyperlinks can turn a simple worksheet into a complete record-keeping system, which looks professional and is easy to use. Click on the links below for details.
| CREATE A HYPERLINK IN EXCEL |
| REMOVE HYPERLINKS IN EXCEL |
One of the basic Excel requirements for anyone working with large amounts of data is the Excel filter. Excel has two main filtering types, which are described in the links below.
| EXCEL AUTOFILTER (BASIC FILTER) |
| EXCEL ADVANCED FILTER |
Learn how to use Excel Pivot Tables to quickly and easily analyse large amounts of data.
| EXCEL PIVOT TABLES - (Basic Introduction) |
Sometimes you may want to protect your spreadsheet from being viewed or written to by others. The following pages describe how to password protect an entire workbook or individual sheets within an Excel file.
| PASSWORD PROTECT EXCEL FILE |
Click the link below for details of how to produce a PDF version of your Excel spreadsheet.
| CONVERT EXCEL TO PDF |