Excel Strikethrough Shortcut and Other Ways to Cross Out

The strikethrough shortcut in Excel is Ctrl+5 on Windows and ⌘+Shift+X on a Mac. Strikethrough draws a line through text, which is handy for crossing out finished tasks, old prices or cancelled orders. This guide covers the shortcut, the menu route, crossing out part of a cell, and how to make Excel cross out rows by itself when a task is marked done.

The strikethrough shortcut on Windows and Mac#

Select one or more cells and press the shortcut. Press it again to remove the line. It works like a switch, the same way Ctrl+B switches bold on and off.

A few details make it work every time:

• Use the 5 on the main row of keys, above the letters. The 5 on the number pad doesn't trigger strikethrough.
• Select whole ranges to cross out many cells at once, or click a row number to cross out a whole row.
• Strikethrough changes only the look. The value stays the same, so a crossed-out 120 is still added by SUM.

How to add strikethrough with Format Cells#

The Format Cells dialog works in every version and is the way to go if a shortcut is blocked by another app:

1. Select the cells.
2. Press Ctrl+1 (Mac: ⌘1), or right-click and choose Format Cells.
3. Open the Font tab.
4. Under Effects, tick Strikethrough, then click OK.

Excel for Windows has no strikethrough button on the Home tab by default. If you use it a lot, add one: go to File > Options > Quick Access Toolbar, set "Choose commands from" to All Commands, pick Strikethrough and click Add. Once it's on the Quick Access Toolbar, pressing Alt shows a number you can use as a shortcut too.

How to cross out only part of the text in a cell#

You can strike through some words and leave the rest:

1. Double-click the cell, or press F2 (Mac: Control+U), to edit it.
2. Select the characters to cross out with the mouse, or with Shift and the arrow keys.
3. Press Ctrl+5 (Mac: ⌘+Shift+X), or use Format Cells, which then shows only the Font tab.
4. Press Enter.

This works on typed text only. A formula's result is formatted as one piece, so you can cross out the whole cell but not part of it.

How to strikethrough completed tasks automatically#

Conditional formatting can cross out a row as soon as its status says Done, so the look always matches the data. With tasks in A2:C7 and the status in column C:

1. Select A2:C7.
2. Choose Home > Conditional Formatting > New Rule.
3. Pick Use a formula to determine which cells to format.
4. Type =$C2="Done".
5. Click Format, tick Strikethrough on the Font tab, choose a grey font color, and click OK twice.

The $ before C keeps every cell in the row looking at column C, while the row number changes from row to row. Change any status to Done and that row crosses out; change it back and the line disappears.

If your list uses checkboxes, which store TRUE when ticked, use =$D2=TRUE with the checkbox column instead. The guide to checkboxes in Excel shows how to add them and build the same rule.

Why formulas can't count crossed-out cells#

Excel functions read the value in a cell, not its formatting. COUNTIF, SUMIF and FILTER can't tell whether a cell has a line through it. That's a problem when someone crosses out tasks by hand and then asks how many are done.

The fix is to store the meaning in the data and let formatting follow it. Keep a Status column, use the conditional formatting rule above for the look, and count with COUNTIF:

=COUNTIF(C2:C7,"Done")

On the task list in the exercise below, that returns 3. You can also total, filter and sort by status, which you can't do by strikethrough. This is the same idea as the custom number formats guide: formatting changes how a value looks, never what it is.

How to remove strikethrough#

To remove the line, select the cells and press the same shortcut again, or untick Strikethrough in Format Cells. If the line comes from a conditional formatting rule, the shortcut won't remove it; change the status or delete the rule in Home > Conditional Formatting > Manage Rules.

To strip all formatting at once, including bold, colors and number formats, use Home > Clear > Clear Formats. To copy strikethrough and other formatting from one cell to another, use the Format Painter; see how to use the Format Painter.

Other formatting shortcuts worth learning#

Strikethrough sits alongside a handful of shortcuts that come up in everyday work and in timed Excel tests:

For currency and percentages in more detail, read how to format numbers as currency and percent. The Excel keyboard shortcuts cheat sheet has the full list, from navigation to formulas.

Practise it#

Shortcuts stick when your fingers learn them, not your eyes. Practise formatting shortcuts in a live spreadsheet: bold headers and format currency and percentages from the keyboard. Then practise more formatting with italic, underline, comma style and dates. To see where your basics stand overall, take the Excel level test.