How do I convert a column of text URLs into active hyperlinks in Excel?

Question

If you don't want to make a macro and as long as you don't mind an additional column, then just create a new column alongside your column of URLs.

In the new column type in the formula =HYPERLINK(A1) (replacing A1 with whatever cell you are interested in). Then copy the formula down the rest of the 200 entries.

NOTE: This solution does not work if the cell A1 contains a string longer than 255 characters. It results in a #VALUE! error

Create the macro as here:

On the Tools menu in Microsoft Excel, point to Macro, and then click Visual Basic Editor. On the Insert menu, click Module. Copy and paste this code into the code window of the module. It will automatically name itself HyperAdd.

Sub HyperAdd()

    'Converts each text hyperlink selected into a working hyperlink

    For Each xCell In Selection
        ActiveSheet.Hyperlinks.Add Anchor:=xCell, Address:=xCell.Formula
    Next xCell

End Sub

When you're finished pasting your macro, click Close and Return to Microsoft Excel on the File menu.

Then select the required cells and click macro and click run.

NOTE Do NOT select the whole column! Select ONLY the cells you wish to be changed to clickable links else you will end up in a neverending loop and have to restart Excel! Done!

Pretty easy way for rather short lists:

1. Double click on the box where the url is
2. Enter

You have your link ;)

Here's a way I found. I'm on a Mac using Excel 2011. If column B had the text values you want to be hyperlinks, put this formula in the cell C1 (or D1 or whatever as long as it's a free column): =HYPERLINK(B1,B1) This will insert a hyperlink with the location as the link text and the "friendly name" as the link text. If you have another column that has a friendly name for each link, you could use that too. Then, you could hide the text column if you didn't want to see it.

If you have a list of IDs of something, and the urls were all http://website.com/folder/ID, such as:

A1  | B1
101 | http://website.com/folder/101
102 | http://website.com/folder/102
103 | http://website.com/folder/103
104 | http://website.com/folder/104

you could use something like =HYPERLINK("http://website.com/folder/"&A1,A1) and you wouldn't need the list of urls. That was my situation and worked nicely.

According to this post: http://excelhints.com/2007/06/12/hyperlink-formula-in-excel/ this method will work in Excel 2007 as well.

OK, here's a hokey solution, but I just can't figure out how to get Excel to evaluate a column of URLs as hyperlinks in bulk.

1. Create a formula, ="=hyperlink(""" & A1 & """)"
2. Drag down
3. Copy new formula column
4. Paste Special Values-only over the original column
5. Highlight column, click Ctrl-H (to replace), finding and replacing = with = (somehow forces re-evaluation of cells).
6. Cells should now be clickable as hyperlinks. If you want the blue/underline style, then just highlight all cells and choose the Hyperlink style.

The hyperlink style alone won't convert to clickable links, and the "Insert Hyperlink" dialog can't seem to use the text as the address for a bunch of cells in bulk. Aside from that, F2 and Enter through all cells would do it, but that's tedious for a lot of cells.