Cell shading in Excel is a fill color or pattern applied behind a cell’s contents. If you want to remove shading throughout a worksheet, first determine whether it comes from ordinary cell formatting, a table style, or conditional formatting.
Remove ordinary fill from the entire sheet
- Select the entire worksheet by clicking the Select All button at the intersection of the row and column headings, or use the appropriate keyboard shortcut.
- Open the Home tab.
- Open the Fill Color menu.
- Choose No Fill.
This removes ordinary fill formatting from the selected cells without deleting their values or formulas.
If shading remains, check conditional formatting
Conditional-formatting rules can apply colors automatically based on values or formulas. No Fill does not necessarily remove those rules. Review Conditional Formatting rules before deleting them, because they may encode useful business logic.
Table styles can also add alternating colors
An Excel table can display banded rows or other shading through its table style. Change the table style or its banded-row setting if the colors come from the table rather than direct cell fill.
Do not use Clear All unless you mean it
Clear All removes much more than shading and can erase values, formulas, comments, and other formatting. No Fill is the safer choice when fill color is the only thing you want to remove.
Check printing separately
If your goal is a clean printed worksheet, use Print Preview after changing the formatting. Gridlines, conditional formats, and printer settings can affect the printed result differently from what you expect from the normal worksheet view.
Matt Jacobs has been working as an IT consultant for small businesses since receiving his Master’s degree in 2003. While he still does some consulting work, his primary focus now is on creating technology support content for SupportYourTech.com.
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