How to Create a Weekly Schedule in Excel (2 Suitable Methods)

The weekly schedule organizes your daily life and gives a pleasant view of your weekly work. In this tutorial, we are going to demonstrate to you the proper steps to create a weekly schedule for your weekly working life. Fortunately, you may also utilize the prepared template provided by Microsoft. So, we hope this article will be fruitful for you to create a weekly schedule in Excel.

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How to Create a Weekly Schedule in Excel: 2 Methods

We have illustrated 2 handy methods to create a weekly schedule in Excel. One of them is basic Excel editing. You need not bring a template for this. On the other hand, we discussed the process of inserting the templates in the second method. You can use any of these methods as per your preference.

1. Creating a Weekly Schedule in Excel Without Templates

Though Microsoft Excel provides templates for making weekly schedules, you may want to make a customized schedule for your satisfaction. As we all want to make something of our own. Do you think there is no way to create a weekly schedule manually? You are wrong. Here we will explain the steps to create a weekly schedule in Excel without templates.

Step 1: Create Outlines for Weekly Schedule

First of all, you need to create a proper outline for your weekly schedule. It will give your schedule a stylish outlook that makes it look attractive.

Initially, use the Merge & Center option from the Alignment ribbon group for cell B2 to I2 and then write the heading “WEEKLY SCHEDULE“.
Then, go to Cell Styles. From there select Heading 2.

Then, from cell B4, write down the Starting Time, Time Interval, and Ending Time for your working schedule. Here we use the starting time of 8:00 AM, take the time interval of 1 hour, and the ending time at 5:00 PM. You can insert it based on your need.

Step 2: Enter Necessary Time and Name of Day

Now, you have to enter the time and weekdays in your schedule. It is necessary for proper visualization of our assigned work in time and day.
Enter your starting time and then drag down the Fill Handle tool to the ending time of your work. See the image below to get a basic idea.

After that, write the first working day and again drag down the Autofill feature for other weekdays.

Finally, you have entered the day with time for your weekly schedule.

Step 3: Make a Table

Now, we are going to make an Excel table with our data. The table will give a decent look at our schedule.
Firstly, select the entire data then go to Insert tab >> pick Table.

A dialog box will appear named Create Table. Check the My table has headers. Then press OK.

Note: Also, you can press CTRL + T as a keyboard shortcut to create a table.

Finally, a table has been created.

Step 4: Create a List of Activities

After creating the table and opening a new sheet write up the Activities list which you want to put in your schedule.

Afterward, create a table just like before and select My table has headers. Press OK.

Later, a table has been created with your activities list.

Step 5: Specify the Weekends

You may need to highlight the weekend by Conditional Formatting.

Select a cell of the weekend. Here we pick a cell H7 and go to Conditional Formatting >> move to New Rule.

A New Formatting Rule dialog box will pop out. Then select Use a formula to determine which cells to format >> pick the entire range where you wanted to format in the box of Format values where this formula is true. Then, move to Format.

Now, the Format Cells dialog box will appear under the Fill option to pick a color to format your sheet.
Press OK.

Then again you will get the New Formatting Rule box and select OK.

Finally, you have formatted your weekends in your schedule.

Step 6: Create Drop-down Options Using Data Validation Tool

In this step, we gonna show you an interesting thing. Probably, have a lot of activities, and it will be handy if you can pick the suitable activity in the Weekly Schedule instead of typing it every time. In that case, we have to use the Data Validation feature of Excel.

In the very beginning, select the weekdays and go to the Data tab >> move to Data Validation.

The Data Validation dialog window will pop out. Go to Settings >> under Allow box select List. In the Source box, select the table named Activities which was created earlier.

Then, you have to move the Error Alert option. Uncheck Show error alert after invalid data is entered. Click on OK.

Finally, a drop-down icon will take place in all the cells, and from there you can enter your work schedule.

Step 7: Input Your Activities Now!

As we said earlier, the drop-down icon provides you with the Activities list table. From there, you can pick your preferred activities in your schedule.

Finally, your weekly schedule has been created. Look at the image for better visualization.

2. Creating a Weekly Schedule in Excel with Templates

Also, you can use the Weekly Chore Schedule template. Remember, this template is only for Microsoft 365 users. However, we can modify the templates according to our preferences and use them for our daily work. It helps us in many ways. As the templates are saved in Excel, you don’t need to bother to create the outlines. It is a time-saving task to do so. You can also insert some data and format it in the templates.

Step 1: Pick the Template from Excel’s Built-in Templates

To enter the templates, you have to go to the File tab and pick the Weekly chore schedule.

Then, a dialog window will pop out and from there select Create.

A template like the image below will appear on your worksheet.

Step 2: Modify the Template

You can easily modify the templates according to the employee and work list of your preference. Here, we have modified some data with a view to completing our schedule.

Download Practice Workbook

Download the following practice workbook. It will help you to realize the topic more clearly.

Create a Weekly Schedule in Excel.xlsx

Conclusion

That’s all about today’s session. And these are ways to create a weekly schedule in Excel. Please let us know in the comments section if you have any questions or suggestions. For a better understanding, please download the practice sheet. Thanks for your patience in reading this article.

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