How to Add Bullet Points in Google Sheets?

Isn’t it amazing that adding bullet points to items on Google Sheets involves more rigmarole compared to Microsoft Word or Google Docs? It would be nice to have it available to you on the horizontal toolbar like in Word, but alas it’s not meant to be.

Regardless, you can use loopholes, copy-paste shenanigans, and create Excel Alt codes in order to format your spreadsheet like you’re using Google Docs and MS Word.

How to Add Bullet Points in Google Sheets

Step 1: First off, open a new spreadsheet for Google Sheets or use old relevant sheets that could use those bullet points. For example, this chart can benefit from either indentation or bullet points.

Step 2: On the second sheet, we have items separated by semicolon. At the time, I didn’t know how to put in bullet points per item on the same cell. We can do that now.

Regardless, here are the methods available to you to add bullets to your items.

Method 1: Use Alt + 7 to Produce Bullet Point

Step 1: Click on the cell you want to add a bullet point to. Afterwards, either press F2 or double-click the cell to go into “Edit” mode like so.

Step 2: Press Alt + 7 (from the Numeric Pad) to get the bullet point then press Enter. Microsoft Excel and Google Sheets actually have the same alt codes, and the alt code for a bullet in both is Alt + 7.

Step 3: Apply the same technique to all the cells you want to add bullet points to, like so. This will give you bullets for everything. You can use either Alt + NumPad 7 or copy and paste the bullet you got.

Step 4: You can make “Microsoft Word” or “Google Docs” style bullet points by selecting the bulleted items and adding an indent on them.

To do this, select all the bulleted cells. Afterwards, go to the “Format” menu, “Number” submenu, and select, “Custom Number Format“.

Step 5: On the “Custom number formats” dialog box, enter ”     @” (that’s five spaces and the @ sign). This will indent the bullet points visibly like the bullets you use on MS Word.

This should result in the following. The bulleted cells now have indents on every item. Isn’t it much cleaner to look at than before?

Example Spreadsheet: Make a copy of the example spreadsheet

Method 2: Use Indentation and Custom Number Format

Alternatively, you can add the bullet point along with the indent instead of the text inside the cell. This means that you won’t end up accidentally deleting the bullet point because it’s part of the formatting. Do the following.

Step 1: Select the items again. Notice that the bullet points are now gone. I’ve removed them to show you the alternative.

Step 2: Go access “Custom number format” like before when adding indents. That’s “Format” menu, then “Number” submenu, then scroll down to the last item, which is “Custom number format“.

Step 3: You can do the same thing you did earlier to add indents. Put in five spaces and the “@”sign on the “Custom number format” dialog box’s format bar. However, you can add a bullet before the “@”sign this time around!

This should result in the following. It looks the same as the results of the Alt + 7 method, but notice how the text on the bar doesn’t contain the bullet this time.

This method makes it easier to change the bullet symbol in one go too instead of having to copy and paste the bullet for each item.

Step 4: Aside from the “Alt + NumPad 7” bullet, you can also use these symbols as bullets. Just copy and then paste. Or copy, paste on Notepad to remove formatting, then paste on Google Sheets.

• ○ ► ✓

You can use various bullets at your disposal!

Method 3: Add Multiple Bullet Points in One Cell

Step 1: Let’s go over the aforementioned list we have of the top Bluetooth speakers of 2022. The pros and cons list on those are in paragraph form for now. Let’s separate them into bullets now.

Step 2: Double-click the cell or press F2 to get it into “Edit” mode. Use “Alt + NumPad 7” or paste some sort of bullet character you can use to separate items before each sentence.

Step 3: Use “Alt + Enter” to separate the bulleted items from one another and allow them to exist in the same cell instead of needing to add a separate cell to separate them.

This results in cleaner formatting all-in-all.

Without it, the formatting gets weird.

Step 4: Apply this technique to the rest of the unformatted items. Copy-paste a bullet or press “Alt + NumPad 7” and then press “Alt + Enter” on every item. It should look like this by the time you’re through.

Example Spreadsheet: Make a copy of the example spreadsheet

What More Can Be Said?

You have multiple ways to do bullets per cell. Use Alt + NumPad 7 in order to make the Excel Alt code bullet character on Google Sheets. Just copy and paste that bullet on any cell requiring it and you now have a bulleted list available.

You can also use “Custom number format” and indent the bulleted items or incorporate the bullet into the indentation formatting so you won’t have to touch the text. Finally, you need to use Alt + 7 or copy-paste bullets plus Alt + Enter to allow same-cell bulleted lists to exist. These techniques will make you a more efficient Google Sheets user.

References:

1. “How to Insert BULLET POINTS in Google Sheets“, SpreadsheetPoint.com, June 29, 2022
2. “How to Insert Bullet Points in Google Sheets“, GSuiteTips.com, Retrieved June 30, 20222
3. Lee Stanton, “How To Add Bullet Points In Google Sheets“, Alphr.com, November 26, 2020
4. “How to Add Bullet Points in Excel & Google Sheets“, AutomateExcel.com, Retrieved June 30, 20222