How to Show Negative Numbers in Brackets in MS Excel?

In accounting and financial models sometimes you will want to show negative numbers in brackets and in red color.

For example, you may want to show an expense of $5,000 as (5,000)or (-5,000).

To so so, follow the following steps:

1. Right click on the cell that you want to format.

2. Click on Format Cells.

3. From the ‘Number’ sub menu, select Custom.

4. You will now see various custom formatting styles. Scroll down and you will see something like: 0.00_ ;[Red]-0.00

5. Just above the list there is an area titles ‘Type’. here yoy can edit this formatting style. Change it to 0.00_ ;[Red](0.00)

6. Press OK, and you’re done

A number like -5,000 will look as follows with different formatting:

0.00_ ;[Red](0.00) will produce (5,000.00)

0.00_ ;[Black](0.00) will produce (5,000.00)

0_ ;[Red](0) will produce (5,000)

Try different formatting options till you get what suits your needs.

Excel Format Cell