Excel: How to display superscript text as data series on chart?
I have a line chart in Excel 2007 that is created from data in the worksheet. It has several series whose titles are displayed in the chart on the right side. The names of the series are of the form XXXyyy, where yyy should be rendered in superscript.
How do I achieve this superscript display of the series titles on the chart?
Solution 1:
I have 2 ways:
1. If you are using only the "1", "2" and "3" digits in superscript, you can change them to these characters:
- character ¹: in your keyboard: alt+0185 / US-International Keyboard: altgr+1
- character ²: in your keyboard: alt+0178 / US-International Keyboard: altgr+2
-
character ³: in your keyboard: alt+0179 / US-International Keyboard: altgr+3
1.1. Note: In alt+#### and similar combos, you have to hold alt and then hit the digits from numpad number keys (not the ones above letters), i.e., alt+0185 = hold alt, press numpad 0, press numpad 1, press numpad 8, press numpad 5, release alt
1.2. Note: I'm not sure about the name of "US-International Keyboard", but in a lot of keyboards I used (one had a similar name) that combos (altgr+1, 2 or 3) worked.
2. You can use another character font. Some fonts are designed for math, so:
2.1. Install one of these fonts:
- DejaVu (and its variants - Sans: normal, condensed, light, mono / Serif: normal, condensed): I think it is the more known of my list
- Cambria Math
- Candara
- Consolas
- Constantia
- Corbel
- Lucida Sans Unicode
- Segoe UI
2.2. Open your excel file, select cells containing legend text and change font to one of these
2.3. Use Windows Charmap (Start > Run > Charmap) or Office Insert > Symbol menu to copy and paste or insert superscript (or subscript) characters you want on the contentes of these cells
2.4. Double click on graph, select the legend and change font to the chosen one
2.5. See an example in my Google Docs using DejaVu Sans: http://goo.gl/VZL0D
HOT TRICK!!!!!!!
If can only copy-paste following characters (including letters) in superscript and subscript. Do it in your Excel file. Remember to use Unicode fonts (you can use mentioned fonts above / this text was copied from Wikipedia and Chris Morgan's answer on a StackOverflow question and edited):
Consolidated for cut-and-pasting purposes, the Unicode standard defines complete sub- and super-scripts for:
numbers and common mathematical symbols ( ⁰ ¹ ² ³ ⁴ ⁵ ⁶ ⁷ ⁸ ⁹ ⁺ ⁻ ⁼ ⁽ ⁾ ₀ ₁ ₂ ₃ ₄ ₅ ₆ ₇ ₈ ₉ ₊ ₋ ₌ ₍ ₎ )
a full superscript Latin lowercase alphabet except q ( ᵃ ᵇ ᶜ ᵈ ᵉ ᶠ ᵍ ʰ ⁱ ʲ ᵏ ˡ ᵐ ⁿ ᵒ ᵖ ʳ ˢ ᵗ ᵘ ᵛ ʷ ˣ ʸ ᶻ )
a limited uppercase Latin alphabet ( ᴬ ᴮ ᴰ ᴱ ᴳ ᴴ ᴵ ᴶ ᴷ ᴸ ᴹ ᴺ ᴼ ᴾ ᴿ ᵀ ᵁ ⱽ ᵂ ) - no C, F, Q, S, X, Y, Z
a few subscripted lowercase letters ( ₐ ₑ ₕ ᵢ ₖ ₗ ₘ ₙ ₒ ₚ ᵣ ₛ ₜ ᵤ ᵥ ₓ )
and some Greek letters ( ᵅ ᵝ ᵞ ᵟ ᵋ ᶿ ᶥ ᶲ ᵠ ᵡ ᵦ ᵧ ᵨ ᵩ ᵪ ).
Note that since these glyphs come from different ranges, they may not be of the same size and position, depending on the typeface.
Solution 2:
In excel 2013, I edited the data series names in the formula bar and when I wanted to insert a "2" as subscript, I just went to INSERT tab > Symbols > Symbol, selected my font, and inserted the character I wanted.