Paste & Match Destination Formatting in Excel & Google Sheets

Written by

Editorial Team

Reviewed by

Laura Tsitlidze

Last updated on May 26, 2023

This tutorial demonstrates how to paste and match destination formatting in Excel and Google Sheets.

paste and match destination formatting 1a

Match Destination Formatting

When pasting data from an external application (Word, PowerPoint, etc.) to Excel, you can either keep the formatting from the source document or match the formatting in Excel. Say you have the following sales dataset in Excel.

paste and match destination formatting

As you can see, the range now has banded rows (blue and white), with Price and Total columns with currency formatting. In a Word document, you have prices to paste in Excel, overwriting Column C.

paste and match destination formatting word

First, copy the data from the external application.

  1. Then, right-click the cell where you want to paste (here, C1)
  2. Choose Match Destination Formatting under Paste Options.

paste and match destination formatting 1

As a result, the Word data is pasted in Column C in Excel. The new data is formatted as currency, not as it was formatted in Word.

paste and match destination formatting final

If you paste data using the shortcut CTRL + V, it keeps formatting from the source (e.g., Word) file.

paste and match destination formatting 3

Quick Access Toolbar

To speed up the process described above, add the Paste and Match Destination Formatting icon to your quick access toolbar in Excel.

  1. Click on the Customize Quick Access Toolbar icon in the toolbar, and choose More Commands…

match destination formatting quick access toolbar

  1. In the Excel Options window, choose All Commands from the Choose commands from drop down.

match destination formatting quick access toolbar 1

  1. Choose Paste and Match Destination Formatting from the list. Click Add then OK.

match destination formatting quick access toolbar 2

Now, the Paste and Match Destination Formatting icon shows up in the toolbar.

match destination formatting quick access toolbar 3

Instead of right-clicking a cell and choosing Match Destination Formatting, you can just select the target cell and click on your new icon in the toolbar to do the same thing.

Match Destination Formatting in Google Sheets

You can also paste data from another application and match destination formatting in Google Sheets.

First, copy the data. Then, in Google Sheets:

  1. Right-click the cell where you want to paste (C1).
  2. Choose Paste Special.
  3. Then, click Paste values only (or use the keyboard shortcut CTRL + SHIFT + V).

google sheets paste and match destination formatting

As a result, the Word data is pasted to Column C in the Google spreadsheet with the formatting already set in Column C.

google sheets paste and match destination formatting 2

As in Excel, if you just paste data using the keyboard shortcut CTRL + V, it keeps the formatting from the source application.

google sheets paste and match destination formatting 3

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