Display numbers as currency

If you want to display numbers as monetary values in Excel 2007, you must format them as currency. To do this, you apply either the Currency or Accounting number format to the cells that you want to format. The number formatting options are available on the Home tab, in the Number group.

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• What's the difference between the Currency and Accounting formats?
• Display numbers as currency
• Remove currency formatting
• Create a workbook template with specific currency formatting settings

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What's the difference between the Currency and Accounting formats?

Both the Currency and Accounting formats are used to display monetary values. The difference between the two formats is explained in the following table.

To change the default currency symbol for Microsoft Office Excel and other Microsoft Office programs, you can change the default regional currency settings in Control Panel. For more information, see Change the default country/region. Although the Accounting Number Format button image does not change when you do this, the currency symbol that you specified in Control Panel will be applied when you use either of the currency number formats.

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Display numbers as currency

As mentioned earlier, you can quickly display a number with the default currency symbol by selecting the cell or range of cells, and then clicking Accounting Number Format in the Number group on the Home tab. (If you want to apply the Currency format instead, select the cells, and press CTRL+SHIFT+$.)

If you want more control over either format, or you want to change other aspects of formatting for your selection, you can use the following procedure.

1. Select the cells that you want to format.

How to select cells, ranges, rows, or columns

2. On the Home tab, click the Dialog Box Launcher next to Number.

3. In the Format Cells dialog box, in the Category list, click Currency or Accounting.

4. In the Symbol box, click the currency symbol that you want.

 Note   If you want to display a monetary value without a currency symbol, you can click None.

5. In the Decimal places box, enter the number of decimal places that you want for the number. For example, to display $1,450 instead of $1,449.99 in the cell, enter 0 in the Decimal places box.

As you make changes, watch the number in the Sample box. It shows you how changing the amount of decimal places will affect the display of a number.

6. In the Negative numbers box, select the display style you want to use for negative numbers. If you don't like the existing options for displaying negative numbers, you can create your own number format. For more information about creating custom formats, see Create or delete a custom number format.

 Note   The Negative numbers box is not available for the Accounting number format. That's because it is standard accounting practice to always show negative numbers in parentheses.

7. To close the Format Cells dialog box, click OK.

If Excel displays ##### in a cell after you apply currency formatting to it, the cell probably isn't wide enough to display the data. To expand the column width, double-click the right boundary of the column containing the cells with the ##### error. This automatically resizes the column to fit the number. You can also drag the right boundary until the columns are the size you want.

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Remove currency formatting

If you want to remove the currency formatting, you can use the following procedure to reset the number format.

1. Select the cells that have currency formatting applied to them.

How to select cells, ranges, rows, or columns

2. On the Home tab, in the Number group, click General.
3. Cells that are formatted with the General format do not have a specific number format.

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Create a workbook template with specific currency formatting settings

If you often use currency formatting in your workbooks, you can save time by creating a workbook that includes specific currency formatting settings, and then saving that workbook as a template (template: A workbook that you create and use as the basis for other similar workbooks. You can create templates for workbooks and worksheets. The default template for workbooks is called Book.xlt. The default template for worksheets is called Sheet.xlt.). You can then use this template to create other workbooks.

Create the template

1. Create a new workbook.
2. Select the worksheet or worksheets for which you want to change the default number formatting.

How to select worksheets

3. Select the specific cells or columns you want to format, and then apply currency formatting to them.
4. Make any other customizations you like to the workbook.
5. Click the Microsoft Office Button , and then click Save As.
6. In the File name box, type the name that you want to use for the template.
7. In the Save as type box, click Excel Template, or click Excel Macro-Enabled Template if the workbook contains macros that you want to make available in the template.
8. Click Save.

The template is automatically placed in the Templates folder.

 Tip    In Windows Vista, the Templates folder is usually C:\Users\<your name>\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Templates. In Microsoft Windows XP, the Templates folder is usually C:\Documents and Settings\<your name>\Application Data\Microsoft\Templates.

9. Close the template.
10. To use the template to create a new workbook, click the Microsoft Office Button , and then click New.
11. Under Templates, click My Templates.
12. In the New dialog box, double-click the template you just created.

Excel creates a new workbook that is based on your template.

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