How to Hide and Unhide Defined Names in Excel

Excel lets a defined name be hidden so it stays out of the Name Manager and the name box. Add-ins and templates use this to keep internal names from cluttering the list, and you may want to do the same. The surprise is that Excel has no button for it, so hiding and unhiding a name normally takes a line of code.

Why hide a defined name

A hidden name still works in formulas, it just does not appear in the Name Manager, the name box, or the paste-name list. Workbooks built from templates or touched by add-ins often carry helper names that are pure noise to anyone reviewing the file. Hiding them keeps the visible name list short and relevant without deleting anything you might still need.

Hide a name with VBA

There is no menu command for this, so the built-in route is the Visual Basic Editor.

1. Press Alt+F11 to open the Visual Basic Editor.
2. Press Ctrl+G to open the Immediate window.
3. Type Names("MyName").Visible = False and press Enter to hide it, replacing MyName with your name.
4. To bring it back, type Names("MyName").Visible = True and press Enter.

Unhide names you cannot see

Unhiding is harder than hiding, because a hidden name does not show up in the Name Manager, so you cannot select it there to flip it back. You either need to know its exact name to use in VBA, or loop through every name in code and set Visible = True on each. There is no native dialog that lists hidden names alongside visible ones, which makes auditing what is actually in a workbook awkward.

Hide and unhide names visually with ModelMint

Name Scrubber shows hidden and visible defined names together in one list, with no code required. Select any names and hide them to declutter, or unhide the ones already hidden, in bulk. It is the easiest way to see everything a workbook actually contains and control what shows up in the Name Manager.