White is the default background color users see while working on Excel sheets. Sometimes when you need to highlight specific cells, different colors are applied to change the background color of those cells. Do you know how to change background color in Excel?

Usually, Excel has 56 colors index that can be used with conditional formatting. This way you can apply some conditions as well as different colors to change the background color. In this procedure, you often choose the cells that needed to be highlighted and then click on the Fill Color option. It simply changes the background color of the selected cells.

You can try several ways that help in changing background colors. Let’s see how many methods are there that you can try:

How to Change Background Color of Special Cells in Excel?

First, we will discuss a simple method that lets you change the color of specific cells in your spreadsheet.

• Open the Home tab and choose the Conditional Formatting option.

• Click on the New Rules option.

• A dialog box will pop up to choose the cells in which you need to apply to format.

• Select the arrow option given at the end.
• Add a new formatting rule with the help of the keyword Is Blank Condition. The Is Blank option is helpful in highlighting the empty background cells.

• Choose the Format option and click on the blue color.

• Press the OK button.

That’s it!

How to Change Background Color in Excel with Fill Color Option?

Using the Fill Color option, you can easily change the background color of cells. For this, you need to follow the steps given below:

• Choose the cells that needed to be highlighted. Open the Home tab and click on the Fill Color icon.
• Select the Color from the drop-down list.

• Or else you can select the cell and open the Home tab. Now choose the Font Settings option given in the Font menu.

• A window of Format Cells will appear. Click on the Fill tab and choose the color you need as a background color from the palette.
• Press OK.
• For more color options, you can even choose customized colors by clicking on the More Colors button.

• The Colors window will pop up. From here, you can choose the Custom color and press the OK button.

• Other than the above-mentioned steps, you can follow another way. Choose a cell and right-click on the cell that needed to be highlighted and click on the Format Cells option. Now follow the above-given steps 2 and 3.

That’s it!

How to Change Background Color in Excel based on the Cell Values with Conditional Formatting?

With the help of conditional formatting, you can change the background color of the cells based on some conditions. These conditions may include duplicate values, value greater than, value less than, values equal to, text in the cell, etc.

• The cell color changes by default when the cell value is updated according to specific conditions.
• Select a cell range or the entire sheet to apply the background color.
• Open the Home tab.
• Select the Conditional Formatting drop-down arrow.
• Choose the “Highlight Cells Rules” option and then click on the “More Rules” option.

• A dialog box New Formatting Rule will pop up once you click on “More Rules”.

• Click on the “Format only cells that contain” rule type and choose the formatting condition you need to apply.
• Put the value and click on the “Format” option.

• Choose the “Fill” header from the “Format Cells” dialog box.
• Click on the color you need to apply and press OK.

• The “New Formatting Rule” window will pop up once again, from which you can find the selected color.
• Press Ok.

Now, all the selected cells are highlighted with the desired background color.

All done! Now, you have more than one answer to how to change background color in Excel.

Things to Consider about Color in Excel:

• As you know, Excel has 56 colors index and you can use conditional formatting to apply colors with different conditions.
• The colors used in Excel play a highly significant role in highlighting a cell range.
• You can manage colors on the basis of colors.
• All empty cells can be highlighted with the colors.
• With the help of different colors, you can highlight greater values as well as lower values.

Final Words:

In this post, you have learned how to change background color in Excel by using different methods. You can try any of the above methods without any risk. To make your sheet presentable, you often tend to seek different options, and highlighting a particular cell or a cell range can directly affect the overall appearance of the data.