There are two ways to apply shading to alternate rows or columns —you can apply the shading by using a simple conditional formatting formula, or you can apply a predefined Excel table style …

Highlight or shade alternate rows of data with colors or patterns to improve the readability of your Excel worksheets.

Make a table to shade or highlight alternate rows. The easiest way to apply shading or highlighting to alternate rows is to make them a table. Tables also include tools to help you analyze your data.

On the Home tab, in the Font group, select the Format Cells dialog box launcher. Keyboard shortcut You can also press CTRL+SHIFT+F. In the Format Cells dialog box, on the Fill tab, under Background Color, select the background color that you want to use. Do one of the following:

You can change the look of a line shape by changing its color, line style, or weight. If you are using Excel, Outlook, Word, or PowerPoint, you can apply a predefined Quick Style to quickly change the look of your line.

You can highlight data in cells by using Fill Color to add or change the background color or pattern of cells. Here's how: Select the cells you want to highlight.

By default, gridlines are displayed in worksheets using the color that is assigned to Automatic. To change the color of gridlines, you can use the following procedure. Select the worksheets for which you want to change the gridline color. Click File > Excel > Options.

To select a row, column, cell, or group of cells, click and drag your mouse pointer to highlight the cells you want. On the Table Design tab (Table tab in OneNote), click the Shading menu. Under Theme Colors or Standard Colors, select the shading color you want. Or, for more color options, click More Colors.

Set varying colors of data markers (bars, columns, lines, pie or doughnut slices, dots, and other shapes) automatically in an Office chart.

Create a custom conditional formatting rule Select the range of cells, the table, or the whole sheet that you want to apply conditional formatting to. On the Home tab, click Conditional Formatting, and then click New Rule. Select a style, for example, 3-Color Scale, select the conditions that you want, and then click OK.