Excel VBA Change Textbox Border Color on condition

So, you are unable to change the Textbox border color. No worries. Here's a simple solution. In VBA, you can use the BorderColor property to change the border color of an element, like a textbox. Its very simple and here in this tutorial I'll show you, step by step, how to change the border color of a textbox based on a condition.

Add a Textbox in Excel

The textbox we are talking about is an ActiveX control. Follow these steps to add a textbox control in your Excel worksheet.

1) Open Excel worksheet. From the above tabs, select the Developer tab and click "Design Mode".

add textbox in excel worksheet

2) Next, click Insert Option (before Design Mode inside Developer tab) and click "Text Box" under "ActiveX Controls".

insert textbox control in excel worksheet

3) Place the textbox anywhere in your worksheet.

4) This is important. Make sure the "Design Mode" (under the Developer tab) is still active. To change the border color of the textbox dynamically using VBA, we have change the BoderStyle property from none to single.

Therefore, right click the textbox and click Properties to open the properties window.

Find BorderStyle property in the properties window and choose frmBorderStyleSingle option.

change textbox properties in excel

5) Now you must Turn off design mode. Click the "Developer tab" and turn off "Design Mode".

Here's a condition. Let us assume, when you enter some data (or some text) in cell F4, it should automically change the textbox border color.

We can toggle the color change also. That is, if cell F4 has value, change color to Red and if its empty, change color to "Black".

The Macro to change textbox border color

Option Explicit

Private Sub Worksheet_Change(ByVal Target As Range)
    If Target.Address = "$F$4" Then
        If Target.Value <> "" Then
            TextBox1.BorderColor = vbRed
        Else
            TextBox1.BorderColor = vbBlack
        End If
    End If
End Sub

The macro to change border color is written inside Worksheet_Change event. So whenever it detects a change in cell F4, it will first check if the box has value or its empty and accordingly, changes the color of the border.

Change Textbox Border Color when it has Focus

This is how you can change textbox border color when the focus is on the textbox.

Option Explicit

Private Sub TextBox1_GotFocus()
    TextBox1.BorderColor = vbRed
End Sub

So, this is what we learned here today.

1) How to add a textbox control in an Excel worksheet.

2) How to change default properties like BorderStyle of a textbox control.

3) How to change border color of a textbox control dynamically using VBA.

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