Display an Excel Pop-up Message Without a Macro

Data Validation to the rescue

Would you like to display a pop-up message when a user enters a value into a cell? You don’t need a macro to achieve this.

Excel’s built-in Data Validation feature allows you to display a message when the user has entered a value in a cell. It is reasonably easy to set this up, see below for instructions.

Let’s say we want to display a message when a user has entered a number in cell B2.

Steps

  1. Select cell B2.
  2. Press in sequence Alt D L do not hold the keys down. This opens the Data Validation dialog.
  3. Select Custom from the Allow drop-down and enter the following formula in the formula box.
    =ISBLANK(B2)

    See image below.

  4. Click the Error Alert tab.
  5. Select Information from the Style drop-down.
  6. Enter a title and enter the message that you want to display.
    See image below.
  7. Click OK.

If you type an entry into cell D2 and press Enter the pop-up will display – see image below.

Clicking OK, Cancel or the top right X will clear the popup.

Clicking the Help button takes you to a Data Validation web site – not very helpful.

If you delete the entry in cell B2 nothing will display.

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7 thoughts on “Display an Excel Pop-up Message Without a Macro

  1. Thank you for this tutorial!
    How about if I want to add conditions to the formula?
    eg. If the value in B2 shows UK, US or Canada, show the pop up message.

    Thanks!

  2. I have a data sheet, in there cell F3 contains value which is sum of A:A, i want a pop message will appear if cell f3 value lower than 300,000