You Can Put AutoComplete On Hold

Q. I work in Excel a great deal and find the AutoComplete feature a superb shortcut—at times. At other times it just gets in the way because I have to stop to correct it when it guesses wrong. Is there a way to toggle it off and on? And is there a way to make it smarter—so it’ll guess right more often?

A. Yes, it can be both a timesaver and an annoyance. For those not familiar with AutoComplete, here’s how it works: When you start typing words into Excel, it examines all the past entries in that column and if it thinks it has a match, it tries to complete the word. If you accept the guess, either just keep working or press the Enter key. Otherwise, you have to stop and correct it.

No, you can’t make it smarter. But considering its limitations, it really does pretty well.

Here’s how to turn it off: Go into the Tool menu, clicking on Options and Edit. Then clear the check from the box named Enable AutoComplete for cell values and click OK.

All it takes is the removal of a check to disable the AutoComplete function.