Solved Excel 'Automatic' cell border colour is not black. Why?

I have Office 2021 but I noticed the same in my previous Office versions.
I am forever having to change the cell borders to 'Black' because I feel cell borders should be black.
Am I under the wrong impression that 'Automatic' should be 'Black' colour?
Is there a reason 'Automatic' colour is not black?
How do I change the default 'Automatic' colour to 'Black' for all new workbooks and worksheets so I don't have to keep doing it manually.

Odd. The default on my version, Microsoft 365, is black.

Have you changed the Theme in Page Layout?

In the Format Cells dialogue if I click the dropdown arrow for Colour the colour alongside Automatic is Black. What is it on your system?

Thanks.
The Theme is 'Office' and I haven't changed it.

'Automatic' seems to be black but it doesn't show as black when the borders are inserted.
If I manually choose the 'Black' colour (Second colour in from the top left) then 'black' borders are inserted.

The borders are automatic instead of black so that they adjust with the theme. Black borders are not so great when your Excel looks like this.

View attachment 167574

pseymour said:

Black borders are not so great when your Excel looks like this.

Click to expand...

I suspect that in that in that case the borders would show as white, but that's just guessing.

pseymour said:

so that they adjust with the theme

Click to expand...

My Theme is the basic 'Office' so I thought they would be black.

I believe you can change the Gridlines color in Options/Advanced but then you have to save it as a Template...

wiganken said:

I suspect that in that in that case the borders would show as white, but that's just guessing.
My Theme is the basic 'Office' so I thought they would be black.

Click to expand...

Okay, you can argue if you want, but that's the reason. Excel has a lot of available themes, including custom ones, and it has more users than just you.

Stock (Automatic) Sheet1 "template" is gray Gridlines - as far as I know, it has been that since day one.

Edwin said:

I believe you can change the Gridlines color

Click to expand...

Thanks - Yes, that's easy and I have done that. It is the cell border colour I am talking about.

Also @neldog - same thing.

I have tried clicking on different themes but the cell border colour is still grey using the Automatic setting. I have manually select black to get it be black.

If you are feeling brave... you can do what Edwin said and edit the Excel Sheet1 template and then every time you make a new spreadsheet it will be as you want with each new file. It seems like a few decades ago I did that with the "Word" template, and it caused some problems. Now I don't mess with it anymore. I bet Edwin knows how to do it correctly, but I say don't do it. When I did it with "Word" it seemed so straight forward, but I found a way to mess it up.

neldog said:

you can do what Edwin said

Click to expand...

Yes, but Edwin was referring to the Gridline colours. not cell Border colours.

wiganken said:

Yes, but Edwin was referring to the Gridline colours. not cell Border colours.

Click to expand...

Oh, sorry, bad reading by me. My bad...

Try going to Home --> Cell Styles --> New Cell Style, choose the color you want the border to be and then save it.

Edit: Oh, don't forget to name your cell style something meaningful.

wiganken said:

Edwin was referring to the Gridline colours. not cell Border colours.

Click to expand...

Yup, sorry bout that! I was barkin up the wrong tree!
However, you can still save a copy via Format cells..., or Save a copy as a Template...

I solved it.
I had been using personalised templates located in C:\Users\Ken\Documents\Custom Office Templates folder. One of my customisations was the gridline colour. I had changed it from the 'Automatic' colour due to my having a non-white sheet colour. I find a white worksheet background too bright.

I simply moved my templates from that folder to the desktop to test it and it worked. Excel 'Automatic' cell borders are now inserted in black.

I tested it by changing the gridline colour again and the problem returned so that confirmed it. 'Automatic' Gridline colour and 'Automatic' cell border colour are linked . Changing Gridline colour from 'Automatic' affects how 'Automatic' cell border colour is inserted.

Strangely, Excel has 'remembered' my other personalised settings (except for my preferred gridline colour, which was the source of the problem) even though my templates are no longer present (so not being used) so that's better still. It means I keep all but one of my settings as well as solve the problem. I can live with the default gridline colour.

I checked for and found Office updates and installed them and it still kept my customisations so that's good.