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Excel - Use Conditional Formatting to Highlight Today's Tasks - Episode 1269

375 views · Published 20 October 2010 · 3:29 · Indexed 2 October 2026

Channel: MrExcel.com · 2010 · Education

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Microsoft Excel Tutorial: Jim from California is trying to organize his kid's home chores list. He was trying to mark the current weekday's chores with conditional formatting and a cell that contained =NOW(). In Episode #1269, Bill shows us a method to solve this problem.

Welcome back to the MrExcel podcast. In this episode, we will be discussing a great question from Jim, a Cleveland Indians fan from California. Jim was trying to organize his household chores and wanted to know if there was a way to use Excel to highlight the tasks for the current day. Today, we will be exploring how to create a formula that will identify the current day and highlight the corresponding tasks.

To start, we will use the formula =TODAY() or =NOW() to return today's date. However, since the NOW function updates every second, we will use the TODAY function for more accurate results. We will then use conditional formatting to create a rule that will highlight all tasks for the current day. In Excel 2003, you will need to go to Format ＞ Conditional Formatting and change the first drop-down to "Formula is". In newer versions of Excel, you can go to Home ＞ Conditional Formatting ＞ New Rule.

Next, we will write the formula to check if the text of today's date is equal to the value in column A. This will ensure that the formatting is applied to all tasks for the current day. We will use the formula =TEXT(TODAY(),"DDDD") to return the day of the week in text format. Then, we will use the formula =A2 to check if the value in column A is equal to the text of today's date. We will also use the dollar sign before the column letter to ensure that the formula is applied to all cells in the column.

Once the formula is written, we can format the cells however we want. In this example, we will use a yellow, bold, italic font with a red background. However, you can customize the formatting to match your data. And the best part is, this formatting will automatically update every day, highlighting the tasks for the current day. So, whether you have real dates or just three-letter abbreviations in column A, this formula will work for you.

Thank you for tuning in to this episode of the MrExcel podcast. I hope this tip helps you stay organized and efficient with your daily tasks. Don't forget to send in your questions and suggestions for future episodes. And as always, thank you for stopping by and we'll see you next time for another netcast from MrExcel.

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Table of Contents:
(00:00) Highlighting Today 
(00:12) Formula for Highlighting Today's Tasks 
(00:34) Using Equal Today 
(01:13) Creating a New Rule 
(02:44) Formatting the Highlight 
(03:04) Using Real Dates vs. Text 
(03:14) Clicking Like really helps the algorithm

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