How to send automatic notifications from Sheets

Stop the Status Update Emails! Automate Notifications with Google Sheets. Tired of your team emailing you every time they complete a task? There’s a better way! Google Sheets can now send you automatic email notifications when data is changed, saving you and your team time. Learn how to set up this handy feature in this quick and easy guide!

How to set up a conditional notification

Below we have an action plan and the manager wants to be notified when the actions are completed. To save her team emailing him every time they complete a task, they just need to change the status on the plan and Sheets will automatically send her an email with the tasks that have been changed to “Completed”. It’s really easy and quick to set up.

Right-click on the table on the column you want to monitor for changes, i.e. column B and select “Conditional notifications”.

This will open the “Add rule” sidebar.

First, set a name for the rule.

Next, set which column you want to monitor for changes, i.e. column B.

I don’t want to send an email for any change, I only want to send it if the status is changed to “Completed”, so I need to add a condition. Click “Add condition”.

Click on “None” to open the possible conditions.

Then select “Text is exactly” as we are looking for a specific text. You might recognise these from the Conditional Formatting menu.

Then enter the text you’re looking for, i.e. “Completed”.

Next we set up the email notification. As it states, we can send the notification to a maximum of 10 people.

With the emails have two choices, we either manually type in the emails we want to send the notification to, or we can choose a column which has emails. For this example, I’m just going to send it to myself.

Note the second option is useful if you you have a column with the emails, and where you can send emails to different people depending on the change that’s happened. For example, one manager could receive notifications of tasks completed by their team, and a different manager the ones done by their team.

Here I’ve entered my email and click “Save” to save the rule.

You will see the rule is saved and it shows a little summary of what it does. You also have the option to turn the notification off, without having to delete it, which is a nice feature.

And that’s it! It’s set up!

How to delete or edit a conditional notification

You can delete or edit the rule from here.

Conditional notifications in practice

When an action is done, the team member marks it as “Completed”.

The manager (me in this case) will then receive an email showing the update.

If there are a number of changes made in a short space of time, the manager will receive just one email with a summary of all the changes.

It’s possible to see a history of the triggers in the last 30 days, just open the Conditional Notifications sidebar and click on “View Trigger History”. It will tell you which rules were triggered, when they were sent, who to, and if they were successful.

How to see the trigger history

How to set a specific range to monitor

Generally it’s applied to specific columns, but you can set a customised range or specific cell by choosing “Customised range” in the “In this column” section.

Conditional notifications has been a feature in Sheets for years but this update makes it much more user-friendly and useful. It’s a great way to stay informed without extra work.

Note, this is currently limited to certain Business, Enterprise, and Education editions. More info here.

Quick Sheets tips on YouTube.