Excel for Windows (Desktop Application)
Welcome to the Excel for Windows (Desktop Application) feedback forum! This is the place for users to send us suggestions and ideas on how to improve. If you think you have found a bug, please send us feedback in-app instead! To do so, please click “File”, then “Feedback”, then “Send a Frown” in Excel. This way, we will get detailed information that will help us better diagnose the problem.
To help us build the best version of Excel ever, we have partnered with UserVoice, a third-party service, to create this site to hear your suggestions and ideas for the next version of Excel. Your use of the portal and your submission is subject to the UserVoice Terms of Service & Privacy Policy, including the license terms. Please do not send any novel or patentable ideas, copyrighted materials, samples or demos for which you do not want to grant a license to Microsoft.
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Make Conditional Formatting Rules Editor window sizable.
Make Conditional Formatting Rules Editor window sizable.
141 votesThank you for taking your time to suggest and vote for “make conditional formatting rules editor window sizeable”. While this is an interesting suggestion, we don’t think that we’ll be able to work on this in the near future. When our plans are updated we will re-open voting and you will be notified.
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Fix the "There's a problem with the clipboard" issue
The issue with "There's a problem with the clipboard..." while copy and pasting is still as issue. I was using Office 2010 and there was no problem. I am now using Office 365 and this issue is prevalent. It manifests itself when pasting a value from a cell containing a formula and disappears when disabling Live Preview. I was able to copy and paste "normal" cell contents fine before the error message appears so the official response of "another program has locked the clipboard" doesn't really hold up. It looks more like Excel has locked the clipboard from itself.
There…
36 votesThank you for voting for “there’s a problem with the clipboard” issue. I this this refers to this error dialog: “There’s a problem with the clipboard, but you can still paste your content within this workbook."
When Excel shows this dialog after a copy (CTRL+C) action, it means that another app has a lock on the system clipboard. In this situation you can still paste within Excel. However you cannot paste to another app like Word or Outlook which uses the clipboard.
A while ago we made some improvements for Office365 users so that this error message only shows once per Excel instance. This was based on customer feedback – the design change prevents it popping up multiple successive times when the clipboard is locked. We have also considered never showing the error dialog, but there was user feedback that this message is informative and helpful in some cases.
Should…
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Add Get Parameter button to Power Query and avoid Privacy / Formula.Firewall problems
It's fantastic that you can pick up named ranges in Excel and pass them to Power Query as parameters. However the process is cumbersome and often results in Formula.Firewall warnings or other issues.
This leads to having to switch Privacy Levels to "Ignore" or having to write a query within a query rather than nice and clean "parameter" queries.
It would really simplify things if we could quickly create parameter queries (including a drop down to select parameter type) and that these queries would be immune from the Privacy warnings.
335 votesHi all,
Thank you for taking your time to suggest and vote for adding Get Parameter button to Power Query. We do think that this suggestion has merit but we don’t think that we’ll be able to devote time to it in the near future. When our plans are updated we will re-open voting and you will be notified.
Thanks,
Guy Hunkin
Excel Program Manager -
Setting Autofill Default
Setting Autofill Default
No option to set AutoFill default to the option you want.
Even for numbers or dates you should be able to use "Copy Cells" in stead of "Fill series"110 votesThis is a good idea, but we don’t think we’ll be able to support this in the near future. As a workaround, you can use the autocorrect widget in the bottom right of the fill range to set the option you want.
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Open multiple files with the same file name
Allow excel to open files with the same name but different location at the same time
31 votesThanks for your suggestion! Unfortunately we will not be able to address this in the near future. We will re-open voting when our plans update.
-Sharon -
Pin worksheet tab
I would like a simple option to allow you to pin worksheets so they are always available in the workbook irrespective of the number of worksheets there are.
I.e. when you right click the worksheet tab there is an option to pin so you can quickly gain access when you have a large number of worksheets.
33 votesThis is a great suggestion – thank you for taking the time to give us feedback! Unfortunately, we will not be able to work on pinned worksheet tabs in the near future. We will re-open voting if our plans change.
-Sharon -
Filtering: Show count in filter box and add navigation buttons
Filtering:
When filter button is pressed on any column, the drop down menu should -
Show number of recurrences of each unique value displayed in the drop down list, in brackets on the right side of each unique value, in grey font. This will be very helpful in knowing, by just dropping down filter menu, how many records are there for each of unique values shown in the filter drop down list. Currently we have to filter each value and run a countif formula in a help column or look at the bottom line that shows how many records are…
50 votesThanks for all of the suggestions related to filtering. Unfortunately, we will not be able to address this in the near future. We will re-open voting if our plans change.
-Sharon -
Format cell as a checkbox (TRUE, FALSE)
Offer a format that displays the boolean value of a cell as a checked box if TRUE, unchecked box if FALSE, grayed box if text or other nonbool.
Bonus: Toggle value OnClick would be intuitive.
Lots of uses for this. Current options are awkward for users. Yes/No dropdown is not as good as a checkbox for touch/mobile.
193 votesThanks for the idea! We think formatting cells as a checkbox is an interesting suggestion, but we won’t be able to address it in the near future. We may re-open voting if our plans change.
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recent filters
Have a Control with the most recent filters (last 5 to 10 filters), so the filters can be reapplied to an existing table.
This should enable power users to work faster and Archive more in Excel.
37 votesThanks for taking the time to give us feedback about your filtering experience. Unfortunately, we won’t be able to address this in the near future. We will re-open voting if our plans change.
-Sharon -
Make the Go To box SCALABLE
Formulas / Trace Dependents / make the resulting list box SCALABLE.
It is 100% useless if the full name of the referenced cells cannot be seen in their entirety, which is usually the case.
I know others have been asking for this for YEARS.
21 votesThanks for the feedback! Unfortunately we will not be able to address this in the near future. We will re-open voting if our plans change.
-Sharon -
Allow the option to list pinned files either alphabetically or by recent use.
Excel 2016 switched the order of the pinned files from alphabetical to most recently used. IMHO, that was a big improvement. Apparent;y that change has been reversed.
Pre-2016 I only pinned 4 of 5 files that were hard to find or only used monthly. Files I used Daily I pulled from the recently used files.
In 2016 I switched to pinning about 20 files. The ones I used daily or weekly are always near the top. The ones I use monthly are farther down but easier to find than going to the various directories.
For me, going back to the…
59 votesThanks for taking the time to suggest this! We think having more control over how your pinned files are sorted is a great idea, but we won’t be able to address it in the near future. We will re-open voting if our plans change.
-Sharon -
Enable Headers and Footers to include variables based on a cell reference
It would be great if a cell reference could be used within a header and/or footer
27 votesThanks for taking the time to share this suggestion with us. We unfortunately won’t be able to address it in the near future – we will re-open voting if our plans change.
-Sharon -
Fill Handle For Worksheet Copy
If I have a worksheet called January and I Ctrl+Drag that sheet to make a copy, Excel should automatically call it February. Use the same logic as the Fill Handle (support months, weekdays, and any custom list).
109 votesThank you for taking your time to suggest and vote for the “fill handle for worksheet copy”. While this is a good suggestion, we are not likely to be able to devote time to it in the near future. When our plans are updated we will re-open voting and you will be notified.
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Display Status Bar of Inactive Window 2016 Excel
In Excel 2010 we were able to highlight numbers and have their sums displayed in the grey status bar towards the bottom of the sheet. Working with 2 monitors, this feature was very helpful.
After upgrading to Excel 2016 the status bar of the non active/selected workbook disappears instead of the sum being viewable of the non active workbook.
The feature was helpful for at least 2 open excel instances where we can view the sum of the non active workbook and it would be great to have back instead of being forced to click in out of each workbook…
78 votesThanks for the suggestion! We will not be able to address displaying the status bar in an inactive window in the near future, but if our plans change we may re-open voting.
-Sharon -
Enable Merged Cell Sorting
For rows or columns that contain merged cells, all rows or columns associated with the merged cells should be treated and sorted as 1 row or column.
37 votesThank you for voting on “enable merged cell sorting”. While this is an interesting idea, we are not able to devote time to it in the near future. When our plans are updated, we will reopen voting and you will receive a notification.
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Support multi-row worksheet tabs, or vertical tabs, or font size (some way to see more sheet tabs at a time)
(2015-11-05 Dan [MS] - recategorized and clarified idea title)
471 votesThank you for taking your time to suggest and vote for this. We do think that this suggestion has merit but we don’t think that we’ll be able to devote time to it in the near future. When our plans are updated we will re-open voting and you will be notified.
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Filtered Columns - change colour of icon
When a filter is applied in a header row, the filtered column(s) gets a "Funnel" icon to indicate that it has been filtered. In a row where multiple filters have been applied, if, in addition to having the funnel icon, the "filtered" icons came in a different colour - say a limited choice of colours for the user to pick from - then that would make the filtered columns easier to spot. For a user looking for the first time at a file and wanting to find what columns have been filtered, having the "filtered" icons in a different colour…
36 votesThanks for the great suggestion to make filtered columns more visible. Unfortunately we will not be able to address this in the near future. We will update this item and re-open voting if our plans change.
-Sharon -
Watermark
Add a Watermark Tool with the same functionality as MS Word
57 votesThanks for the suggestion about watermark support! Unfortunately, we won’t be able to address this now. If our plans change, we will re-open voting.
-Sharon -
Give us a "Center Across Selection" option for the Vertical text alignment
"Center Across Selection" is available for Horizontal text alignment but not for Vertical text alignment.
This would be useful for heading columns where the text is rotated through 90 degrees and spans more than one row.
58 votesThank you for taking the time to vote for “Give us a ‘center across selection’ option for the vertical text alignment”. While we see merit in this idea, we are not able to work on this in the near future.
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VLookup and Inserting Columns: VLookup should increment the col_index_num when you insert a new column in the range.
When you insert a column and it affects the range referred to by a vlookup, the table range updates but the column index number does not. The column index number should increase with the table range so that the same column is pulled. I can't think of a scenario where inserting columns in a table but not updating the column index is a user's intended course of action.
44 votesSince the XLOOKUP function is now available in Excel to O365 subscribers, we recommend using it to accomplish what you need to do. With XLOOKUP, there’s no index number. You provide a range reference, so it will automatically adjust if you insert a column that causes the range to move.
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