# See what needs attention first.

24 September 2026 · By the Nodary team

Color past dates, upcoming deadlines, missing values and numbers over a threshold. Rules read calculated values, follow their column and appear in readers and printouts.

![Nodary spreadsheet with a past due date in red, upcoming dates in amber, a missing date in blue and a budget over its threshold](https://nodary.ai/release-media/spreadsheet-highlights.png)

A plan with thirty rows hides the three that matter today: the deadline that passed, the one coming up and the budget line that went over. Nodary spreadsheets can now point at them for you, without touching a single value.

## Rules for the questions you actually ask

Select a cell, open Formats and columns, then Highlights. Color past dates, dates within the next days, dates before or after a given day, numbers above, below or between thresholds, text containing a word, and missing or filled values. Common rules are one click away, and each one shows how many cells it affects before you apply it.

## Calculated values, clear priorities

Rules read what a cell shows after calculation, so a budget computed by a formula is judged on its result. When several rules could apply, the first one in the list wins; move rules up or down to set that priority. Dates compare with the reader’s own calendar day, so an overdue task is overdue wherever your team works.

## Visible without relying on color alone

Highlighted cells get a tint, a colored edge and a corner mark. The rule also becomes the cell’s description for screen readers and appears when you hover. Five tones are tuned for dark and light themes, and a high contrast mode draws an outline instead.

## They follow the column, and the team

Rules belong to their column: they move with it, disappear with it and travel through copies of the document. In shared editing, a teammate’s value and your new rule combine. Undo removes the rule without touching values, and the document reader, print view and shared links show the same highlights.

## Try it in your workflow

1. Open the example: one past date, two upcoming dates, a missing date and a budget over 5,000 are already highlighted.
2. Edit Days for the playable prototype and watch its calculated budget lose its highlight.
3. Select a Days cell, open Formats and columns, then Highlights, and add a rule with a threshold.
4. Reorder or remove rules, apply, then undo to return to the previous state.

Up to eight rules per column; highlights change the display only and never the stored values. Dates must be stored as calendar dates (YYYY-MM-DD, as the date column type does). Past and upcoming dates use the reader’s current day; shared links and printouts rendered on the server use the server’s day, which can differ by one day around midnight. Shared links describe rules in English. Rules apply to whole columns, not individual cells, and are not included in CSV or Markdown exports. The demonstration keeps changes on this page only.

The page: https://nodary.ai/updates/highlight-what-needs-attention