Excel Drop Down List

Excel Drop Down List (Table of Contents)

• Drop Down List in Excel
• How to Create Drop Down List in Excel?

Introduction to Drop Down List in Excel

In excel drop-down list is a useful feature that enables us to choose the value from the list box. Drop Down List in Excel is mainly used in an organization like data entry and medical transcription & data dashboards to choose and update the validation data in an easier way from the Drop Down list. Hence Excel Drop Down List saves the time where we can avoid errors in the validation part.

We can easily create a Drop Down list in excel by choosing the data tab where we can find the data validation option.

How to Create a Drop-Down List in Excel?

Click on the data menu and choose data validation menu as shown below.

Click on the Data Validation TAB so that we will get a dialogue box appears as follows.

Now we can see the Validation criteria part where it has to allow option click on the dropbox where it will list the several validation parts like the whole number, decimal, etc.

From the validation, criteria choose the List option to create an Excel Drop Down List which will create and asks for the selection of a cell to display the Drop Down List in Excel.

We can easily create a professional template by using the Drop Down List in Excel where it mainly used for the data validation part.

First, create a set of a database to be shown in the drop-down list this database has to be maintained in one sheet where date comes from this main master database, So it is an important task to the main database need to updated and maintained properly.

Let us now see how to create this with the help of some examples.

Excel Drop Down List – Example #1

Let’s see an example where we are going to create a set of students database with Name, Roll No and Grade. So that it will be useful to choose the name, roll no and grade for the specific students from an excel Drop Down list in the easiest manner.

In the above table, we can see the database which has student name, Roll No & Grade. To create Drop Down list in Excel follow the below steps as shown below:

• Click on the Data Tab. Choose Data Validation.

• Data Validation Dialogue box appears as follows.

• From Validation, criteria choose the List option.

• Select the source tab where excel will ask for the database cell to appear in the drop-down list.
• Once you click on the source tab we get the data validation selection box as follows.

• Select the column where the drop-down list needs to be get displayed and select the columns A2:A8 for student name drop-down list and then click ok.

• Once we gave the selection column we will get a drop-down list as shown below.

Now we can see in the above screenshot an excel drop down list has been created for the student’s name which shows the student’s name list. Drop Down List feature allows us to select students names from the database list so that we can avoid error and also we can avoid entering duplication in the excel sheet.

Now let’s see how to get the Roll No to the drop-down list as follows:

• Go to the data tab.
• Select data validation option.
• You will get the dialogue box which will show validation criteria.
• Choose List option from the drop-down list.
• Place the cell in the F column as shown below in the screenshot to get the drop-down list menu.
• Select the database column from B2:B8.
• Click ok.

So the Result would be:

Now let’s see how to get the Grade to the drop-down list as follows:

• Go to the data tab.
• Select data validation option.
• You will get the dialogue box which will show validation criteria.
• Choose List option from the drop-down list.
• Place the cell in the G column as shown below in the screenshot to get the drop-down list menu.
• Select the database column from C2:C8.
• Click ok.

Result will be:

Hence we have created a drop-down list for all Student name, Roll No, Grade. We can now create the Drop Down list to choose the students name and their corresponding roll no and grade as shown in the below screenshot.

Now we can see that drop-down list has been created for only one column to apply to all the column wherever we need we have to do copy and paste the drop down box to the specific cell.

Now in the above screenshot, we can see that drop-down list has been applied to all the column where its show the entire students name from the database as well as Roll No and Grade.

Drop Down List in Excel – Example #2

In this example, we will see how to add “YES” or “NO” drop-down with a clear example.

Here in the status, We are now going to add Drop Down List “YES” Or “NO” to know the present status of the students.

• Go to the data tab.
• Select data validation option.
• You will get the dialogue box which will show validation criteria.
• Choose List option from the drop-down list.

• Place the cell in the F column as shown below in the screenshot to get the drop-down list menu.
• Select the database column from B2:B3.
• Click ok.

Now we can see that above drop-down list box of YES or NO to check the student present status.

Drop Down List in Excel – Example #3

Error Message

Here what happens if we type invalid data i.e unknown name list from the database. Drop Down List feature first checks in the database list, if the name is matching excel will not show an error dialogue box.

Assume that we have typed invalid data in the student name list like “geethas” where we can see that this student name is not all in the database list. Drop down list feature check in the database whether names are matching or not if not it will display an error dialogue box as follows.

We can edit this error message so that the end user can understand what data he needs to enter it.

In data validation, we can see that there are three tabs like Settings, Input Message, and Error Alert.

Here we are going to edit the error message as per our student database and follow the below procedure.

• Go to data validation tab.
• Select Error Alert tab.

• We will get the above dialogue box with Title and Error Message.
• Give the Title Name and Error Message to be displayed for the cell.

Hence we have updated the Title Name and Error message to be displayed now let’s see how the error is going to appear in the dialogue box.

Assume that we have typed unknown name in the student name column and the drop-down list feature will throw the following error with custom Title and Error Message as follows.

We can see that we have typed unknown name like “Samantha” which is not there in the database and the excel shown as error message where we have given manually in the Error Message Dialogue box as highlighted above.

Things to Remember 

• Maintain a separate database for creating a drop down list in excel.
• Use an appropriate error message wherever we need.
• Apply data validation to the specific cell.

Conclusion

Excel Drop Down list is mainly used to create professional templates and data entry forms to make the works easier.

Recommended Articles

This has been a guide to Drop Down List in Excel. Here we discuss how to create Drop Down List in Excel along with practical examples and downloadable excel template. You can also go through our other suggested articles –

1. How to Edit Drop Down List in Excel?
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3. Excel List Box
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