How To Color Code Drop Down List for Whole Row in Google Sheets
Learn how to color code drop down lists in Google Sheets to enhance your data visualization. This tutorial covers step-by-step instructions for applying color coding to entire rows based on drop down selections.
You want to color code a drop down list in Google Sheets. Here we have a few options and we want to change it into a drop down list and then color code it. Let's select the entire column A, right click, and scroll down to drop down. We can also go up to the insert menu and click drop down there. We may want to change our column from A1 to A2 to not include the header . And we have a criteria drop down we have completed in progress, and let's do overdue as well. And here on the left side we have grey buttons with a drop down arrow itself. We can change this color here to green, in progress to yellow, and overdue to red. If we want custom colors here, we can click customize.
And now we can select any color in the spectrum. Maybe we want like a neon green, maybe a little bit darker. Click okay. And for our yellow, click customize. Maybe we want more of a , neon yellow. Click okay. And for overdue, let's make it really red. And you can look at these. in here and say, these are pretty bright colors. Maybe these are more of what you want than the available colors here, which may be a little more pastel or dull. We can always reset it here at this reset button to gray, click reset for each of these. There you go. If you want the entire cell filled, We need to do one more step is click on our data validation rules, go down to advanced options , scroll down some more and click the arrow or plain text .
Either one of these is going to fill the entire cell with color. But if you're looking to color code the entire row based on the A column, we need to do one more thing. And that's go up to. Format , conditional formatting , and over here, we're going to select our format rules , text contains , and if we select this for A column, we can change the color, but actually let's select A1 to C, and instead of text contains, we're going to do a custom formula, formula, equals A1, equals, overdue in quotes. And we're going to select red. We need to make sure that the A has a dollar sign in front of it, and now the entire row is being color coded based on this drop down list.
If we want to do another one, we say done, add another rule, select custom formula , again change A to A colon C for the entire range . Custom formula equals dollar sign A one. equals, in quotes, in progress. And let's change that to that yellow. Great. Done. Add another rule. A colon C. Custom formula equals A, but with the dollar sign . One equals completed. And we'll fill this with green. Click done. And there we're filling the entire row based on the drop down list. If you're looking to get more out of your Google Sheets than you ever have before, create cool customizations, awesome automations, subscribe
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