Flowcharts
By Richard Rost
11 months ago
Creating a Flowchart in Microsoft Excel In this Microsoft Excel tutorial, I will show you how to create flowcharts using Excel's built-in shapes and connectors. We'll cover adding basic flowchart elements like Terminators, Processes, and Decisions, and you'll learn tips for formatting and connecting them. We'll also explore useful techniques such as hyperlinking between Excel sheets for interactive designs. MembersThere is no extended cut, but here is the file download: Silver Members and up get access to view Extended Cut videos, when available. Gold Members can download the files from class plus get access to the Code Vault. If you're not a member, Join Today!
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Keywords TechHelp Excel, Excel flowchart, flowchart creation, shape formatting, Excel connector types, Excel hyperlink feature, Excel flowchart symbols, Excel decision diamond, Excel process rectangle, Excel terminator oval, Excel check mark and X, Excel text formatting, Excel insert text box, Excel format painter
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Transcript
Today, we're going to take a look at how to make flowcharts in Excel. I love the forums on my website, and today, user Jeffrey said that he's looking for some suggestions for some good flowchart software. There are lots of good software options out there. Timothy recommended MindMeister. Alex recommended a few things. Me, I just use Excel. And then, of course, Lars is like, all right, I'm already waiting for the video. This was only two hours ago, and I'm like, okay, dammit. Now I sat around playing with it, and I never covered flowcharting in my full Excel course. So I'm like, let's have some fun. I built several flowcharts over the years using Excel. It's nice and simple. It's easy to do. I'm going to show you how to do it right now.
The basic shapes in most flowcharts: you've got the Terminator, which is like the start or end of a process. You've got a process step itself, and then you've got a decision. As you can see here, we've got a Terminator to start it, a process, do some stuff, a decision, are you done? And then it ends with another Terminator. I'll be back. Nope, wrong Terminator. But these are the basic ones. There's tons of other symbols, especially if you're doing one specific to databases or programming. I'm not going to get into all those. I'm just going to show you how to do the simple ones, put some connectors in there, and we'll have some fun.
The first thing we'll do is put a Terminator in there for the start. Go up to Insert and then come over to Shapes. If you're not seeing Shapes, it's because I got my Windows smaller because of recording. But if your window is a normal size, like mine usually is, you'll see Shapes right there. If not, if you're dealing with a shrinking window like me here, then you'll see it under Illustrations and then Shapes. That's right there. Now you'll see a ton of different shapes here. Down here you'll even see there's a flowchart section. You can use any of these you want. No one is going to yell at you. Use a smiley face if you want to. But the Terminator is an oval right there. If you hover over it, it'll tell you what it is. So click on that, and then I'll come in here and just draw myself a shape like so. Once you do that, you get the Shape Format tab pops up here on the ribbon. You can change the style right here, drop it down, pick many of these. I'll pick that guy. Then, we'll put some text on it, double click, and we'll put in here Start like that. I'm going to click off of it, click on it again to highlight the whole thing. I'm going to go over to the Home tab. I'm going to hit Center Horizontally and Center Vertically. Let's bold it. We can make the text bigger, just like that. Nice and easy.
How about a process, a rectangle? Again, Insert, Shapes, find a rectangle. You could use any rectangle. Draw it over here like so. I'm going to format it. I like blue for these. Same thing. Double click in here. Do stuff. Click off it. Then we'll go to Home, Center it, bold it. Make it bigger. Now, how do I connect these guys with a little arrow? Well, again, Insert, Shapes, there's an arrow right there. You can use this guy if you want to. Click, and you can draw an arrow anywhere you want. I like to draw it out here first. Then what I'm going to do is I'm going to grab the endpoint, click and drag it, and drop it on one of these dots that appear. It creates what's called a connector then. Do that? Then grab this guy, do the same thing and drop it on there. Now, if this moves, look at that. It stays connected. The arrow follows it. You can change the connector type by right-clicking on it. Go to Connector Types. You can do a connector that's got an elbow, which, for this one, if you move it over here, you can see it makes it like an elbow. Or you can do a curvy one. Curved Connector. See that? The Curved Connector, you can click on this little dot here and draw how high you want the connector to be. I'm just going to go back to a straight connector. Where are you? Right there.
By the way, I should mention, you can do the same thing with the same tools in Word and PowerPoint. The benefit of Excel is that you're not limited by size. You can make this thing as big as you want to. You can print it out just by zooming in and out. You can print as much or as little of it as you want to. Whereas with Word and PowerPoint, you're limited by the size of the document or the slide, of course. You can take these that you make in Excel and just copy and paste them into the other ones too. Of course, Microsoft Access, the red-headed stepchild of the Office family, does not have this stuff. But I can't really think of a time I've ever needed it in Access, but it could come in handy, especially for my genealogy database. This stuff would be nice.
Let's add a decision in here. Yes or no? Again, Insert, Illustrations, Shapes. The decision is the little diamond guy. I'll put the diamond down. Now, so I don't have to go through and reformat the text with all those steps. What you can do is just click on one of these that you've already formatted. Use the format painter and then paint on this guy and then just change the color. Just change the shape fill to what you want. So if you want orange for that, but now you've inherited those text properties like that. If you want to change the shape of the diamond, just do this, where you can make the text smaller, whichever you prefer, just like that. You can also eliminate the margin in here. Notice how if I want to do this, it shrinks it up. If you right-click on this and go to format shape, go to text options and then click this thing here that brings up the text properties, just set all these margins to zero. Then you get rid of all that padding inside the shape. Now you can actually make this smaller like that. You've got more room in there to play. This one I might go with black text, easier to read. Yeah, better.
Let's make our connector, copy and paste this guy, copy-paste, and then we just match it up to these dots like that. There we go. Now, the decision usually is going to have multiple steps coming out of it. Yes, no, whatever. You can use actual text if you want. You can insert, and then go to Illustration Shapes and use a text box, this guy, and just draw it here, put Yes. What I like to do is we'll bold that. We'll make it a little bit bigger like so. It's got a border and a background around it. I'm going to click on that. Go to shape format, make the shape fill, no fill, and the shape outline, no outline. Now it's completely transparent. Now you can set it here if you want to. If you want to make a line that goes from here to the yes and then from the yes to something else, I like to make it two steps. So what I'll do is I'll go copy paste, right, I'll connect this end to here. I'll connect this end to the text box, right, and you just kind of line it where you want like this. Then let's say you're done at this point. So I'll just copy the terminator, copy paste, put this over here. Okay, you're done. Then we'll connect that to this end. Or what you could do is you can connect it to the same point on this yes and make this one. You can see the arrowhead. Watch this little trick idea. We're going to go to shape outline arrows, get rid of the arrowhead. So that's just flat. Now we'll take this guy, connect this to the same dot, and then connect this one over here. It's not 100% perfect, but it works. You can even make this a bit taller like that. There are a lot of tricks you can play. Once you get it taller, you just kind of line it up right. It looks pretty good. But the benefit is it'll still stay connected. It'll move.
What you can do, what I like to do is I like to use an X for no and a check mark for yes and make them like that. People can tell that's yes and no. I think it looks better. We'll do that by just instead of the word yes in here. I'll put an X for no. We'll make this box the right size for that X like that. Then we'll do a shape fill of red, maybe an outline of black. So all right, then we're going to click on this right click and bring it to the front. So the line's behind it now. You just got to make your line straight like that. I think on here instead of a text box, I used a shape. That's why it's got those rounded edges. You could do that or you could use a circle. Insert shape. Let's do a circle for the check mark. Here's a circle, draw a circle. Let's make this guy green. So shape fill will be that shaded green. How do you get the check mark in there? Well, we're going to double click. So we got our blinking cursor. I'm going to go to insert and then symbols and pick symbol over here. Just find the check mark. There's a square root sign. I think it's way down toward the bottom. Where did I find you? Is it check mark in here somewhere? It's right there. Of course, it's on my recent use symbols because I just played with it a few minutes ago before this video. So insert it and then close. There's your check mark. We're going to make it bigger. Let's get rid of those margins in there again. Right click format shape. Text options. This thing. Get rid of the margins. Then we can size that so it fits. Actually, let's do the centering stuff. There we go. Then there's your yes. We'll take this. We'll put it over here. Then we'll just connect it up. I'll copy this guy. Copy paste. Connect you to here. Connect you to there. I'll copy one of the arrows. Copy paste. Connect this to the top of that. Connect this to that. Right click. Let's make it a curved connector like so. Pretty cool, huh?
Another cool thing you can do: you can hyperlink this stuff. You can make a workbook that's got multiple pages with multiple flowcharts in it. For example, let's make a sheet two. More instructions. You can come over here. Let's say you want to make one for help. I'll just copy this box. Copy paste. We'll put this up here. This could be any of the shapes. Actually, let's use this guy. Copy paste. I'll put this over here. We'll make this the universal symbol for help. We'll do a fill that's dark blue with a question mark in it. Right. Then we'll click on this guy right click and just off the screen. Let me move this down. Right click. Right click. Go to link. Place in this document. You can link to a web page if you want to. You can create a new document. You can link to an email. I'm going to link to sheet two. You can define a named range, whatever. Hit okay. Now, if the user comes over here, and they get the finger, click on it. They'll jump you to the next sheet or another entire flowchart. You can make it interactive with just using these links. You can make it like a go-back link on here and it'll bring it back there. That's pretty cool. You need to explain what 'do stuff' is. I'm going to do stuff.
There are a lot more options. You can reroute all the connectors. There's all kinds of stuff you can do. You can play with a ton of different symbols. But this just gives you the basics. Go play with it. Have fun. If you want to learn more about this stuff, let me know. I'll post a comment down below, and I'll make more flowcharting stuff.
Before we go, I'm going to leave you with some of my favorite flowcharts. Feel free to pause the video to enjoy. This was me a few years ago. Not so much now. I've got pretty much all the power tools I need. This is one of my favorites. This one's been around for years. Of course, there's version 2.0. Oh, someone's beaming in. Can't forget the Trekkies. I know this one's going to upset somebody. It's just for fun, folks. Can't forget the beer flowchart. Finally, how to choose an OS. Got a favorite flowchart that I didn't have here? Well, post a comment down below and be sure to either link to it or if you're in my forums on my website, just upload it.
While you're on my website, be sure to check out my complete Excel course. I got lots and lots of lessons for all kinds of different things, formulas, pivot tables, you name it. That's how you build flowcharts in Excel. Nice and simple. You don't need any other software. It's probably already on your machine. So that's it for your TechHelp video for today. Hope you learned something. Live long and prosper, my friends. I'll see you next time.
I'm excited to announce that I'm creating a brand new series of lessons focused on programming in Microsoft Excel VBA. If you've been looking to take your Excel skills to the next level and learn how to automate tasks, write custom macros, and unleash the full power of Excel VBA, these lessons are for you. Sign up now on my website at the link shown. You'll find a copy in the description down below the video window, and I'll send you more information on this exciting new series.
If you'd like to see me make more Excel TechHelp videos, post a comment down below and say I want more Excel. The vast majority of my videos are for Microsoft Access, the database program, because that's been my forte for the past three decades or so. However, I love Excel, and I'm more than happy to make more videos for Excel, Word, PowerPoint, and all the other topics that I teach. As you know, the squeaky wheel gets the grease so make your voice heard and let me know you want more Excel videos.
TOPICS:
Creating flowcharts in Excel
Basic flowchart shapes
Inserting shapes in Excel
Formatting flowchart shapes
Adding connectors between shapes
Different connector types
Centering and bolding text in shapes
Using Format Painter for shapes
Adding decision shapes
Creating text boxes for flowcharts
Using checkmarks and X symbols
Creating hyperlinks in flowcharts
Making flowcharts interactive
Benefits of using Excel for flowcharts
COMMERCIAL:
In today's video, we're learning about making flowcharts in Excel. You'll discover how to create simple flowchart elements like Terminators, Process Steps, and Decisions. I'll walk you through inserting and formatting shapes, connecting them using arrows, and even personalizing your flowcharts with symbols like check marks and Xs. We'll discuss the advantages of using Excel over Word and PowerPoint, like unlimited size and seamless printing. You'll also see how to hyperlink within flowcharts for interactivity. Stay tuned for some humorous flowchart favorites at the end. You'll find the complete video on my YouTube channel and on my website at the link shown. Live long and prosper my friends.
Quiz
Q1. What primary software does the tutorial suggest using for creating flowcharts?
A. MindMeister
B. Microsoft Excel
C. Microsoft Word
D. Microsoft PowerPoint
Q2. What is the shape typically used for a Terminator in a flowchart?
A. Rectangle
B. Diamond
C. Oval
D. Triangle
Q3. How can you make a flowchart shape's text properties consistent with another shape?
A. By retyping the text manually
B. Using Drag and drop
C. By copying text and pasting
D. Using the Format Painter tool
Q4. What benefit does Excel provide over Word and PowerPoint when creating flowcharts, according to the tutorial?
A. A wider variety of shapes
B. Easier to add text
C. Not limited by size of document or slide
D. More advanced connectors
Q5. Which feature allows a shape or text box to link to another sheet or chart in Excel?
A. Connector
B. Hyperlink
C. Embedded Link
D. Navigation Pane
Q6. Which of the following tools can be used to eliminate the padding inside a shape?
A. Format Text Tool
B. Shape Format Tab
C. Format Shape > Text Options
D. Insert Text Box
Q7. Which shape does the tutorial suggest using to represent a decision in a flowchart?
A. Circle
B. Diamond
C. Rectangle
D. Trapezoid
Q8. When resizing Excel windows and missing the Shapes option, where can it be found?
A. File Tab
B. Page Layout Tab
C. View Tab
D. Under Illustrations
Q9. What type of connectors does Excel provide for connecting different flowchart elements?
A. Straight, Elbow, Curved
B. Linear, Angular, Circular
C. Horizontal, Vertical, Diagonal
D. Wired, Wireless, Hybrid
Q10. What general advice does the tutorial provide about using different types of symbols in Excel flowcharts?
A. Reinvent new symbols for each chart
B. Stick to traditional flowchart symbols only
C. Experiment and have fun with different symbols
D. Only use computer-generated shapes
Answers: 1-B; 2-C; 3-D; 4-C; 5-B; 6-C; 7-B; 8-D; 9-A; 10-C
DISCLAIMER: Quiz questions are AI generated. If you find any that are wrong, don't make sense, or aren't related to the video topic at hand, then please post a comment and let me know. Thanks.
Summary
Today's TechHelp tutorial from Excel Learning Zone covers creating flowcharts in Excel. One of our forum members, Jeffrey, recently asked for recommendations on good flowchart software. While there are many options available, I prefer using Excel since it's simple and effective. I've built numerous flowcharts using Excel over the years, and I'll show you how to do it too. Let's explore the fundamental shapes used in flowcharting, such as the Terminator, which signifies the beginning or end of a process, the process step itself, and the decision point. Today, I'll guide you through creating these elements using Excel.
To start, insert a Terminator shape using the Insert tab and select Shapes. In a standard-sized window, the Shapes option will appear directly; if not, you'll find it under Illustrations. Choose the oval shape for the Terminator and draw it on your worksheet. Once you select the shape, the Shape Format tab will let you customize its style and add text, like "Start." Align and format the text as you wish. Moving on to process steps, use a rectangle shape and format it similarly.
To connect shapes, select an arrow from the Insert tab under Shapes. After drawing the arrow, connect its endpoints to small dots on the shapes to create connectors. These connectors adjust as you move the shapes. You can change the connector type by right-clicking it and choosing different styles, such as elbow or curved connectors.
This process is not exclusive to Excel; the same tools work in Word and PowerPoint, but Excel provides more flexibility in size, allowing you to print as much as you need. You can copy and paste flowcharts from Excel into other applications if needed. Although Access lacks these tools, it's generally not necessary for database tasks.
To add a decision shape, use a diamond, and for consistency, you can use Format Painter to apply similar text styles. Adjust the shape's properties, like margins, for a cleaner look. Connect the decision shape similarly and use text boxes for options like "Yes" or "No." Customize the boxes' appearance as needed, and add arrows to connect steps.
For additional functionality, Excel allows hyperlinking elements. You can link shapes to another worksheet or even a webpage, making your flowchart interactive. This feature is useful for navigating between different parts of a complex flowchart.
These are just the basics of creating flowcharts in Excel. Feel free to experiment with different symbols and connector types to enhance your flowcharts. If you're interested in learning more, let me know in the comments.
For those interested in Excel VBA programming, I'm launching a new series of lessons. These will teach you how to automate tasks, create custom macros, and fully leverage Excel's capabilities. Sign up on my website for more details.
If there's a demand for more Excel videos, let me know in the comments. Although my expertise is in Microsoft Access, I'm happy to explore more Excel content alongside other Microsoft Office tools. Your feedback is appreciated and guides the content I create.
For a detailed video tutorial with step-by-step instructions on everything discussed here, visit my website. Live long and prosper, my friends.
Topic List
Creating flowcharts in Excel
Basic flowchart shapes
Inserting shapes in Excel
Formatting flowchart shapes
Adding connectors between shapes
Different connector types
Centering and bolding text in shapes
Using Format Painter for shapes
Adding decision shapes
Creating text boxes for flowcharts
Using checkmarks and X symbols
Creating hyperlinks in flowcharts
Making flowcharts interactive
Benefits of using Excel for flowcharts
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