Jul
11

How to disable Animation in Excel 2013

by | updated on

Do you enjoy the latest version of Microsoft Office yet? If you do, then you have noticed all those new features and enhancements that have been added to it.

At first sight, Excel 2013 seems to have a more modern and stylish interface with animated movement of the selection box, smooth zooming and fluid switching between menus and worksheets, etc. When I click on a cell in the sheet, the green border of the cell moves smoothly from the current cell to the new one. If I type in a new value in the table, the updates on my spreadsheet are a kind of rolling numbers that go past like in a slot-machine. It looks cool!

But if you have a slow computer you might find the animation annoying because all it will do for you is slow down the working process in the program.

I've surfed different support forums and blogs to share all the discovered solutions with you.

The easiest way - disable hardware graphics acceleration

I've found a nice article that suggests this simple solution. It doesn't affect other programs or Office applications and helps to disable animation with a few mouse clicks.

  • Open Excel, click on File, choose Options. You'll see the Excel Options dialog box as on the following screenshot
    Choose to Disable hardware graphics acceleration
  • Scroll down to the Display section and then tick the box "Disable hardware graphics acceleration"
  • Click OK and work in peace with your spreadsheets again.

Disable animation across Office 2013 - edit the Registry

If the animation effects get on your nerves when you are working in other Office 2013 applications, there is a trick how to turn them off across Office 2013 at once. Just follow these simple steps:

  • Press Win + R key combination to open the Run dialog box.
  • Type "regedit" (without the quotes) in the Open edit box.
  • Click OK.
    Open the registry editor
Note. You may see the User Account Control dialog box. If it displays, click Yes to continue.
  • Now Registry Editor is open. Navigate to the following key: HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\15.0\Common\Graphics

    Don't worry if you can't find the Graphics key under the Common key, just right-click on the Common key and select New -> Key from the popup menu. A new key is added to the bottom of the list under the Common key and the name is highlighted. Type "Graphics" for the name of the key.
    For details, you can take a look at this post.

  • Right-click in an empty area on the right side of the editor and select New -> DWORD (32-bit) Value from the popup menu.

    Create a new value to disable animation

  • Name that new value "DisableAnimations".
  • Double-click on the new value and set the value to 1 in the Value data edit box.
  • Click OK.
    Set the value to 1 to remove animation effects
  • Close the Registry Editor.
  • Restart your Office application and the animation effects will no longer give a pain in your neck or eyes ☺.

If you start feeling bored without these effects, you can restore default animation, go back into the Registry Editor and change the Value data of DisableAnimation to 0 or simply delete the DWORD.

Turn off Office 2013 animation without the Registry change

There is one more way to turn off animation in Office 2013, which is common practice and widely suggested in the comments to the related articles. It does NOT involve the Registry change.

  • Press the Windows logo key + U to open The Ease of Access Center.
  • Find the option "Use the computer without a display" and click on it.
  • Under Adjust time limits and flashing visuals tick the box "Turn off all unnecessary animations (when possible)".
    Select the option to turn off all unnecessary animations
  • Click Apply and then OK.
  • Open Office 2013 to see the effect.

It doesn't matter what solution you choose, they all work a treat. Turning the animation off will increase productivity and help you avoid the annoyance. Feel free to pick the solution that works best for you!