How to stop Excel following hyperlinks when I click on them?

In Word I can use Ctrl+Click on the rare occasion that I want to follow a link rather than, you know, do the editing that Word is actually for.

Is there some way to get similar behaviour in Excel 2010, 2003, 2013?

I am sick of accidentally switching to IE or Outlook every time I try and select a cell that has a hyperlink attached.

Results of my prior research here on SuperUser and via popular search engines have not been very fruitful (e.g. http://blogs.office.com/b/microsoft-excel/archive/2011/04/12/hyperlinks-in-excel-hot-or-not.aspx) I am not interested in hearing how I can click and hold to select the cell, or run VBscript or Macros to strip all hyperlinks from a workbook. I want something that conforms with the UI I expect from a non browser application and applies to documents other people have created.

Solution 1:

In Excel 2013, whitespace clicking will select the cell without following the URL, but you have to pay attention. If the icon changes to the hand icon on mouseover, it will follow the URL. If the icon changes to the big white cross, it will select the cell without following the URL. Changing row height or column width can help to increase the amount of whitespace.

Still, I wish that MS had thought to make URL clicks act the same in Excel 2013 as in Word 2013, because it is an annoyance.

"There is no such thing as a foolproof system. Someone will make a better fool, tomorrow." @LoneWolffe

Solution 2:

I found that you can click the cell and hold the mouse button down for about one second. After that the cursor turns into the usual cross, as depicted below:

This works in Excel 2007, 2010, 2013 and 2016. If it works in 2003 or Office 365, please update my answer. =)

Solution 3:

What I have found (on Excel 2010 for Mac, at least) is that you can right click then left click the cell. That leaves you with the cell selected but does not follow the link. It becomes like a single motion and is not too annoying.