notes attached to cells not visible, broken since last excel update (Office 365 on Mac)

I had the same problem with Office 365 on my Desktop computer.  I would hover the cross over the cell with the note, the arrow pops up pointing to the cell but no note.  I had hundreds of notes in my spreadsheet, and none would display.  I tried all the suggestions in this thread and none worked. 

Now, I also use office365 on my Laptop. The offending spreadsheet has always been stored in a dropbox folder.  I found when I opened the dropbox file with my Laptop, I could now see all my notes.   I then saved the spreadsheet to a new file in dropbox.  When I opened the new file with my Desktop, the problem was gone.  All my notes were visible.  So I closed both files, renamed the new file back the original file name, and now all the notes appear in the file with the original name.  Whether I open it with my Desktop or my Laptop. 

dewege 

In my case it turned out that the Note textbox changed it's dimensions and reduced the height to pixel = 1. That's the reason why I saw only the arrows.

Here's what I did to fix it:

1. Right Click on the affected cell --> Show/Hide Note (to have the arrow visible on the screen)

2. Right Click on the affected cell --> Edit Note

3. Zoom in so you can see the very thin hairline that looks to be note textbox.

4. Click on it so the little resizing points appear on the screen.

5. Drag one of them down so the Note appears.

Hope this helps!

I have figured out the root cause of the problem I have experienced, I don't know whether it will apply to everyone with the similar problems:
Starting from Office 2016 and Office 365 Microsoft changed the way comments worked on the cells. New commenting feature has additional features like replying and resolving to comments called "threaded comments". The problem is that you can't see these comments using an earlier version of Office, in my case Office 2013 pro. I suspect even you have a compatible office version you need to be sign in to office 365 with a Microsft account. The thing is, you can actually see and just can't, but since you can't edit the document you can't resize the comment popup window so that you can see the rest of content (your comment). The reason is Microsoft  alters your document puts a reminder in before each of your comments that says “you can actually read the comment but not edit bla bla ”, but this reminder is the only thing visible unless you resize that window which you can't. So the actual content of the comment is unreadable.

The option/solution which does not have this problem for newer versions of Office is: commenting by not choosing “insert comment” but “new note” in the context menu of a cell. Unlike the earlier versions of office this classical way of doing things is renamed from "insert comment" to "new note". So when you use the new office and excel for the first time, you unsuspectingly comment with the "new comment" tool but it's a new thing that does not work as the old comment feature and practically you can't see the contents, and definitely can't edit with earlier versions and un-signed-in office 365 versions. You need to use “new comment”  to avodi future headaches and to be able to see it when using earlier versions of office and un-signed-in office 365 Excel.

In my opinion this is blunder for Microsfot which was the champion of backward compatibility.

edit: you can resize the comment window and see the rest of the comment and your content with office 2013 but you can realize this after days of frustration. You still cant see the content if you are not signed in to office 365.. 

dewege 

I went into - review - notes - drop down and selected "convert to comments"

There will be a column that will open and as you select the cell where the note/comment is, the comment box will be highlighted...

Not what we want like before, be that sort of works.

dewege 

I am using a PC but have been having a very similar issue.  I have discovered that when I open my SS I can hover over the red triangle and the Note contents will show.  But, as soon as I access a hyperlink... and return to my SS... the Note will no longer display when I hover.  My only work around is to close and then re-open my SS.

I have reported this twice.  But, so far... no response.

dewege 

I have had this problem too.  What I found worked was to copy the cell to a new tab.  The Note will show up there (though I had to move the frame buttons to make the square visible).  Then I copied the cell back to the original tab.  This fixed the issue for me.  Hope this helps.

I have faced this problem recently.

Only "Delete Note" option is available in context menu.

If you want to add a new note, please go to the Review menu, the Note option is listed there.

I have same issue.  It looks like MS was nudging users off the old yellow notes feature (which I use a LOT) toward the "comments" side-bar approach.  I hate it when developers get a "good idea" and force us to change, especially with no notice or transition support.  This is a HUGE pain.  But, will MS notice?  I doubt it.

I have just discovered the same issue.  No option to add or edit notes either ... only comments (which I don't need).