How to Create a Flow Chart in Excel

Need to map out a business process, user journey, or decision tree without having to learn complex new software? Believe it or not, Microsoft Excel has everything you need to build a clear, professional-looking flow chart. This tutorial will walk you through exactly how to create a flow chart in Excel, from laying out your first shape to formatting and connecting your final diagram.

Why Create a Flow Chart in Excel?

While dedicated diagramming tools exist, using Excel for flow charts has some practical advantages. First, it’s already on your computer. There's nothing new to buy or install. Second, it keeps your process documentation right next to the data it might relate to, like project plans or budgets. It's an excellent way to visually communicate a process to team members who may not have access to specialized software.

Flow charts help you:

• Standardize processes: Outline the exact steps for tasks like customer onboarding or publishing a blog post, ensuring everyone follows the same procedure.
• Identify bottlenecks: Visually mapping a process makes it easier to spot where delays or inefficiencies occur.
• Simplify complex ideas: Break down a complicated workflow into a simple, step-by-step diagram that anyone can understand.
• Improve communication: A shared visual understanding of a process saves hours of back-and-forth emails and meetings.

Understanding Basic Flow Chart Symbols

Before you start adding shapes, it helps to know what the most common ones mean. While there are dozens of official symbols, you'll likely only need a handful for most business processes.

• Oval (Terminator): This shape represents the start and end points of your process. You’ll have one labeled "Start" and another labeled "End."
• Rectangle (Process): This is the most common symbol. It represents a specific action or task, like "Write draft" or "Send invoice."
• Diamond (Decision): This shape indicates a point where a choice must be made, usually with a "Yes" or "No" answer. For example, "Is article approved?"
• Parallelogram (Data): This represents an input or output of data, such as "Receive user feedback" or "Export customer list."

How to Make a Flow Chart in Excel: Step-by-Step Guide

Let's build a simple flow chart for a content approval process. This is a common workflow for marketing teams, and it's a great example to start with.

Step 1: Set Up Your Canvas

While you can just start adding objects, it’s helpful to prep your spreadsheet grid. Excel's grid can make it difficult to align shapes perfectly. For a cleaner look, you can either turn off the gridlines or create a uniform grid.

• Option A (Turn Off Gridlines): Go to the View tab and uncheck the Gridlines box. This gives you a clean, white background to work on.
• Option B (Create a Square Grid): A square grid makes alignment much easier. Click the triangle at the top-left corner (between row 1 and column A) to select all cells. Right-click on any column header and set the Column Width to 2.14 (or your preferred small size). Right-click on any row header and set the Row Height to 15. Now you have a perfect square grid to snap your shapes to.

Step 2: Insert and Add Your Shapes

Now, let's start building the diagram. All the tools you need are in the Insert tab.

1. Navigate to the Insert tab on the Ribbon.
2. Click on Shapes. A dropdown menu with all available shapes will appear.
3. Find the Flowchart section. Select the oval shape (Terminator).
4. Your cursor will turn into a plus sign. Click and drag on the sheet to draw the shape.
5. Right-click on the shape and select Edit Text. Type "Start" inside it.

Repeat this process to add the other shapes for our content approval workflow. Add the following shapes one below the other:

• A Rectangle (Process) with the text "Write Blog Post Draft."
• A Rectangle (Process) with the text "Submit for Review."
• A Diamond (Decision) with the text "Approved?"
• Another Rectangle (Process) with the text "Publish Article."
• An Oval (Terminator) with the text "End."
• Finally, add one more Rectangle (Process) to the side of the diamond with the text "Revise Draft."

Pro Tip: To keep shapes a uniform size, create the first one and get its size right. Then, copy and paste it (Ctrl+C, Ctrl+V) to create duplicates and just change the text inside.

Step 3: Align and Distribute Your Shapes

Precision makes your flow chart look professional. You can drag and drop shapes to align them using the gridlines, or you can use Excel's built-in alignment tools for perfect placement.

1. Select all the shapes in your main vertical path ("Start," "Write...", "Submit...", "Approved?", "Publish...", "End"). To select multiple shapes, hold down the Shift key while clicking on each one consecutively.
2. With the shapes selected, a Shape Format tab will appear on the Ribbon. Go to this tab.
3. Click the Align button.
4. First, select Align Center. This will line all your shapes up neatly into a single column.
5. Next, click Align again and select Distribute Vertically. This will create equal spacing between each shape.

Now, position your "Revise Draft" shape to the side of the "Approved?" diamond.

Step 4: Connect the Shapes with Lines

A flow chart isn't complete until you show the direction of the process with connector lines.

1. Go back to Insert > Shapes and select a line with an arrow.
2. Hover your cursor over the first shape ("Start"). You’ll see several small grey dots appear on its border. These are attach points.
3. Click on the dot at the bottom of the "Start" oval and drag your cursor down to the dot at the top of the "Write Blog Post Draft" rectangle. Release the mouse button. The line will snap into place and "stick" to the two shapes.
4. Do this for each step in your vertical flow.
5. Now, we need to show the two paths from our "Approved?" diamond.
6. To label your decision paths, insert a Text Box (under Insert > Text Box) next to the "Yes" and "No" lines and type the appropriate label.

Using these connector attach points is important. If you move your shapes later, the lines will stay connected and adjust automatically.

Step 5: Format and Customize Your Flow Chart

Finally, let’s make it visually appealing. Consistency in color and font is essential.

• Change Shape Colors: Select a shape (or multiple shapes at once) and go to the Shape Format tab. Use the Shape Fill and Shape Outline tools to change colors. You can give different colors to process steps, decision points, and terminators to make the chart easier to read.
• Use Pre-set Styles: From the same tab, you can also select one of the pre-set Shape Styles for a quick, professional look.
• Format Your Lines: Select a connector line and use the Shape Outline options to change its color or thickness (Weight).
• Format Text: Use the standard font formatting tools on the Home tab to adjust font size, style, and color for all the text in your shapes.

Tips for Better Excel Flow Charts

• Keep It Simple: Avoid putting too much text in a single shape. Each block should represent one clear action or decision.
• Maintain Consistency: Use the same shape for the same type of action every time. All processes should be rectangles, all decisions should be diamonds.
• Follow a Single Direction: Your diagram should flow logically from one direction, typically top-to-bottom or left-to-right. Avoid lines that cross over each other if possible.
• Use the Format Painter: Once you format one shape perfectly, you can copy its style to others. Select the styled shape, click the Format Painter button on the Home tab, and then click on the shape you want to apply the style to.

Final Thoughts

That's all there is to it. Creating a clear and effective flow chart in Excel is a straightforward process when you tackle it step-by-step. By using shapes, connectors, and smart alignment, you can easily map out workflows to improve clarity and communication across your team.

While Excel is great for manually visualizing static processes, analyzing real-time business data often requires a more powerful and automated approach. Instead of spending hours manually piecing together charts for your campaign performance or sales pipeline in a spreadsheet, we built Graphed to do the heavy lifting for you. Simply connect your data sources like Google Analytics, Shopify, or Salesforce, and ask for the reports you need in plain English. Graphed automatically builds live, interactive dashboards, so you can stop wrestling with manual chart tools and get back to focusing on the insights that drive growth.