How to Work with Worksheet Comments in Excel 2011 for Mac

By Geetesh Bajaj and James Gordon from Office 2011 for Mac All-in-One For Dummies

6 of 11 in Series: The Essentials of Sharing Files in Office 2011 for Mac

Working with comments in Excel 2011 for Mac is a breeze with the Comments group on the Review tab from the Office 2011 for Mac Ribbon. In the following sections, you can find out how to add, edit, and delete a comment in Excel, as well as how to change a comment's appearance.

Inserting a comment in an Excel workbook

You can easily add comments to a worksheet, without disturbing contents or formatting, by using Excel's New Comment feature.

To insert a comment, follow these steps:

Select a cell and choose Insert→New Comment or go to the Ribbon’s Review tab and click the New button in the Comments group.
Type your comment in the text box.
Click outside the text box when you finish typing.

Viewing a comment in Excel 2011

Here are the ways to view a comment:

Hover your mouse over a cell that contains a comment to display it.
Select a cell, go to the Comments group on the Review tab, and click Show to make a comment persistent. Clicking Show a second time hides the comment.
Click the Show All button in the Comments group to display all comments on the worksheet. Clicking Show All a second time hides all comments.

Editing a comment in an Excel workbook

To edit a comment, follow these steps:

Select a cell that contains the red-triangle comment indicator.
Choose Insert→Edit Comment. Alternatively, select the Ribbon’s Review tab, go to the Comments group, and click New.
Click into the comment box and then make your edits.
Click anywhere outside the comment box.

Formatting a comment box in Excel 2011 for Mac

You might consider this feature a bit over the top, but you can format comment boxes to an incredible degree. Here's how to format a comment box:

Select a cell that contains the red-triangle comment indicator.
Choose Insert→Edit Comment. Alternatively, select the Ribbon’s Review tab, go to the Comments group, and click New.
If you’re up for a challenge, double-click the comment box's border. Or take the easy way and choose Format→Comment.
Make the changes you want in the Format Comment dialog, and click OK to see your changes.

Finding comments in an Excel workbook

Jumping from one comment to the next is quick using the Review tab of the Ribbon. On the Ribbon’s Review tab, go to the Comments group and click either Next Comment or Previous Comment to make your move.

Deleting a comment in an Excel 2011 for Mac workbook

You can remove a comment from a cell as easily as you can insert a comment. Select the cell that contains a comment and then go to the Review tab’s Comments group and click Delete. You can also choose Edit→Clear→Comments.