How to Copy Chart Format in Excel

Creating the perfect chart in Excel - with the right colors, fonts, and data labels - can feel like a work of art. Replicating that same design across multiple charts shouldn't require you to start from a blank canvas every single time. This guide will walk you through a few simple but powerful methods to copy chart formatting in Excel, saving you time and ensuring your reports look professional and consistent.

Why Consistent Chart Formatting Matters

Before we get into the "how," let's touch on the "why." You're not just being picky by wanting all your charts to look the same. Consistent formatting is critical for professional-grade reporting for a few key reasons:

• Professionalism and Branding: Whether you're presenting to your team, stakeholders, or clients, a consistent visual style makes your reports look polished and professional. It reinforces your company's brand identity by using designated colors, fonts, and layouts.
• Improved Readability: When all charts follow the same visual rules, your audience knows exactly where to look for information. They can quickly compare data across different charts without being distracted by jarring changes in color, text size, or style. This reduces cognitive load and helps them focus on the insights you're presenting.
• Massive Time Savings: Manually formatting dozens of charts for a report is not just tedious - it's an inefficient use of your time. By learning how to copy formats, you can standardize your reporting process and get your work done in a fraction of the time.

Imagine you're building a monthly marketing dashboard with charts for website traffic, ad spend, lead generation, and social media engagement. Manually adjusting the colors, axis titles, and legend for each of those charts is repetitive and leaves room for error. A single copy-paste command or template can do the work instantly and flawlessly.

Method 1: The Quick and Easy Way with Paste Special

For one-off situations where you just need to make one chart look like another, the classic Copy and Paste Special feature is your best friend. This is the fastest way to transfer a style from a source chart to a destination chart that already exists.

Step-by-Step Instructions:

1. Select the Source Chart: Click on the chart that has the formatting you want to copy. You'll know it's selected when you see a border around it.
2. Copy the Chart: Use the keyboard shortcut Ctrl + C (or Command + C on a Mac) to copy it. Alternatively, you can right-click the chart and select "Copy."
3. Select the Destination Chart: Now, click on the chart you want to apply the formatting to.
4. Use Paste Special: Navigate to the "Home" tab on the Excel ribbon. In the "Clipboard" group, click the dropdown arrow below the "Paste" button and select "Paste Special..." Pro Tip: You can also use the keyboard shortcut Alt + E + S on Windows to open the Paste Special dialog box after you've selected the destination chart. It’s an old-school shortcut that still works perfectly.
5. Choose "Formats": In the Paste Special menu that appears, select the "Formats" radio button.
6. Click "OK": Excel will instantly apply all formatting elements - colors, fonts, axis settings, legend position, and more - from your source chart to the destination chart, without changing the underlying data.

This method is perfect when you're working within a single worksheet and just need to quickly standardize a handful of charts. It's fast, simple, and doesn't require any setup.

Method 2: Create a Reusable Chart Template

If you find yourself creating the same type of formatted chart over and over again for different reports, the Paste Special method becomes inefficient. This is where chart templates shine. By saving a chart's design as a template, you can apply it to any new chart with just a few clicks, ensuring perfect consistency across all your work.

How to Save a Chart Template

Once you've designed a chart exactly the way you want it, you can save its style for future use.

1. Finalize Your Chart Design: Get your "master" chart looking perfect. This includes everything from the color of the data series and the plot area background to the font style of the axis labels and the position of the legend.
2. Right-Click and Save: Right-click anywhere on the chart area (but not on a specific element like a bar or a line). From the context menu, select "Save as Template..."
3. Name Your Template: A dialog box will pop up, prompting you to save the template file. Give it a descriptive name that you'll remember, like "Monthly Sales - Blue Theme" or "Website Traffic - Column Chart." Excel will automatically save it as a .CRTX file in its default chart templates folder, so there's no need to change the location.
4. Click "Save": Your custom chart format is now saved and ready to be used anytime.

How to Apply Your Saved Chart Template

Now that your template is saved, applying it is incredibly simple.

1. Create or Select a Chart: Start by either selecting an existing unformatted chart or creating a new one by highlighting your data and pressing Alt + F1 (the default chart shortcut). Excel will likely create a plain bar or line chart.
2. Change Chart Type: Right-click on your new chart and choose "Change Chart Type..." You can also select the chart, go to the "Chart Design" tab on the ribbon, and click the "Change Chart Type" button.
3. Go to the "Templates" Folder: In the "Change Chart Type" window, look at the list of chart types on the left. At the very top, you should see a folder named "Templates." Click on it.
4. Select Your Template: You will now see thumbnail previews of all the chart templates you've saved. Click on the one you want to apply.
5. Click "OK": Your unformatted chart will instantly transform to match your saved template, applying all the custom styles and formatting rules you defined.

Using templates is a game-changer for anyone who regularly produces reports. It turns a manual, multi-step formatting process into an effortless, two-click task.

Pro Tip: Set a Template as Your Default Chart

To save even more time, you can set one of your custom templates as the default chart type in Excel. This means whenever you select data and press Alt + F1 or go to Insert > Chart, Excel will automatically use your custom template instead of its own default settings.

Here’s how to do it:

1. Navigate to the "Templates" folder within the "Change Chart Type" menu as described above.
2. Right-click on the template you want to set as the default.
3. Select "Set as Default Chart."

Now, creating a perfectly branded chart is just one shortcut away.

Method 3: The "F4" Trick for Repeating Small Changes

Sometimes you don't need to copy an entire chart's format. Maybe you just want to apply a single formatting change - like changing the color of the bars or adding a specific border - to multiple different charts or chart elements. For this, the F4 key is your secret weapon.

The F4 key's function in Microsoft Office is simple: repeat the last action you performed. While it won't copy a whole chart style, it’s incredibly fast for applying small, repetitive formatting tasks.

Here's a practical example:

Let's say you have three different charts and you decide you want to make all the chart titles bolded and colored in your company's official dark blue.

1. Manually Format the First Element: Click on the chart title of your first chart. Manually change the font to bold and set the font color to dark blue.
2. Select the Next Element: Now, go to your second chart and click on its chart title.
3. Press F4: As soon as you select the second chart title, press the F4 key. Excel will instantly repeat your last action - making the text bold and blue.
4. Repeat: Click on the third chart's title and press F4 again. Done.

This trick is useful for more than just titles. You can use it to:

• Change the fill color of data series (e.g., make all the bars on five different charts the same color).
• Apply an outline to the plot area across several charts.
• Change the font size of axis labels for consistency.

Just remember its primary limitation: F4 only repeats the single most recent action. If you change a font to bold (action 1) and then change the color to blue (action 2), pressing F4 will only repeat the color change (action 2).

Final Thoughts

Mastering these quick methods - using Paste Special for one-off needs, saving Chart Templates for long-term consistency, and leveraging the F4 shortcut for minor tweaks - transforms chart creation in Excel from a repetitive chore into a simple, efficient task. By standardizing your visuals, you can produce reports that are not only faster to create but also clearer and more professional.

Of course, even with templates and shortcuts, building reports manually in Excel can still consume a significant part of your week. Stitching data together and formatting visuals is often just the beginning. At Graphed, we automate this entire process. You can connect your data sources like Google Analytics, Shopify, or Facebook Ads and ask for a report using plain English - we'll instantly build a live, interactive dashboard for you, completely formatted and ready to go. No more manual copying and pasting, just actionable insights in seconds.