Show formulas:
Excel offers Show formulas feature by which you can show all your formulas available in excel as text. This property derives at window level hence we will toggle it with the help of ActiveWindow object:
- Navigate Formulas tab
- Locate Formula Auditing group as shown below
- Select Show Formulas and notice the Sheet all formulas will be shown under respective cell. To disappear toggle the same button

Let’s put code to achieve automation in Excel. Point to be noticed will be following VSTO (Visual Studio Tools for Office) as example hence following prerequisites are recommended for C# or VB.Net code examples:
Prerequisites:
- Visual Studio 2015 or above having Microsoft Office for Developer Tool installed
- Create Excel Addin in C# code style (Visual Studio Tools for Office)
- Excel 2010 or above
- Create a ribbon designer and put button
C# code example:
private void btnShowHideFormula_Click(object sender, RibbonControlEventArgs e) { //get window reference excel.Window oWindow = Globals.ThisAddIn.Application.ActiveWindow; //Toggle display formula if (oWindow.DisplayFormulas == false) oWindow.DisplayFormulas = true; else oWindow.DisplayFormulas = false; }
VB.Net code example:
Private Sub btnShowHideFormula_Click(sender As Object, e As RibbonControlEventArgs) Handles btnShowHideFormula.Click 'Bind window reference object dim oWindow as excel.Window oWindow = Globals.ThisAddIn.Application.ActiveWindow() 'Check and toggle show formula If oWindow.DisplayFormulas=false Then oWindow.DisplayFormulas=True Else oWindow.DisplayFormulas=False End If End Sub
Public Sub ShowHideFormula() ActiveWindow.DisplayFormulas = True End Sub
Output: Before

Output: After code execution
