{"id":726,"date":"2019-06-28T15:31:15","date_gmt":"2019-06-28T20:31:15","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.iqaccountingsolutions.com\/blog\/?p=726"},"modified":"2019-07-24T15:22:09","modified_gmt":"2019-07-24T20:22:09","slug":"creating-custom-autofill-lists-in-excel","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.iqaccountingsolutions.com\/blog\/creating-custom-autofill-lists-in-excel\/","title":{"rendered":"Creating Custom Autofill Lists in Excel"},"content":{"rendered":"

Last month we talked about how to use Excel’s Autofill<\/a> feature to automatically fill in a series of words (like days of the week) or numbers. In order for the feature to work Excel needs to be able to recognize the series. So this month I want to show you how you can create your own custom series that can be used with Autofill.<\/p>\n

If you already have the list you want to use typed on a worksheet, highlight the list. Next, or if you are going to enter the list manually, go to File > Options. Select Advanced<\/em> on the left side of the Options<\/em> window and scroll down the the end of the list. Click the Edit Custom Lists<\/em> button which you’ll find the General Section. If you highlighted a list the cell reference will already be entered in the Import List From<\/em> field. Just click the Import<\/em> button. If you didn’t have a list highlighted, NEW LIST should be selected in the Custom Lists section and you can click in the List entries section and start typing your list. Just press Enter<\/em> to go to the next line so you can enter the another item. When you are done click the Add<\/em> button to start building a new list or click OK<\/em> to close the window.<\/p>\n

Now you can fill your list by typing the first item from the list in any cell and dragging the autofill handle or by clicking the Fill<\/em> button and choosing Series and selecting Autofill.<\/p>\n

Since you use the list by typing the first entry, you may want to use a heading for the first list entry. For example, if you want to be able to autofill a list of sales reps, the first rep may have a long name that is inconvenient to type, or if the list changes frequently it may be a challenge to remember what the first list entry is. In a case like that, it may be better to make Sales Reps<\/em> the first entry instead of a name. The only drawback to using a heading as the first entry is that if you want this list to repeat, the the heading will be repeated along with the names.<\/p>\n

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