MsgBox function

08/14/2019 • 4 minutes to read • +2

In this article
Syntax
Settings
Return values
Remarks
Example
See also

Displays a message in a dialog box, waits for the user to click a button, and returns an
Integer indicating which button the user clicked.

７ Note

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Syntax
MsgBox (prompt, [ buttons, ] [ title, ] [ helpfile, context ])

The MsgBox function syntax has these named arguments:

Part Description

prompt Required. String expression displayed as the message in the dialog box. The maximum
length of prompt is approximately 1024 characters, depending on the width of the
characters used. If prompt consists of more than one line, you can separate the lines
by using a carriage return character (Chr(13)), a linefeed character (Chr(10)), or
carriage return - linefeed character combination (Chr(13) & Chr(10)) between each
line.
 Part Description

buttons Optional. Numeric expression that is the sum of values specifying the number and
type of buttons to display, the icon style to use, the identity of the default button, and
the modality of the message box. If omitted, the default value for buttons is 0.

title Optional. String expression displayed in the title bar of the dialog box. If you omit title,
the application name is placed in the title bar.

helpfile Optional. String expression that identifies the Help file to use to provide context-
sensitive Help for the dialog box. If helpfile is provided, context must also be provided.

context Optional. Numeric expression that is the Help context number assigned to the
appropriate Help topic by the Help author. If context is provided, helpfile must also be
provided.

Settings
The buttons argument settings are:

Constant Value Description

vbOKOnly 0 Display OK button only.

vbOKCancel 1 Display OK and Cancel buttons.

vbAbortRetryIgnore 2 Display Abort, Retry, and Ignore buttons.

vbYesNoCancel 3 Display Yes, No, and Cancel buttons.

vbYesNo 4 Display Yes and No buttons.

vbRetryCancel 5 Display Retry and Cancel buttons.

vbCritical 16 Display Critical Message icon.

vbQuestion 32 Display Warning Query icon.

vbExclamation 48 Display Warning Message icon.

vbInformation 64 Display Information Message icon.

 Constant Value Description

vbDefaultButton1 0 First button is default.

vbDefaultButton2 256 Second button is default.

vbDefaultButton3 512 Third button is default.

vbDefaultButton4 768 Fourth button is default.

vbApplicationModal 0 Application modal; the user must respond to the

message box before continuing work in the current
application.

vbSystemModal 4096 System modal; all applications are suspended until

the user responds to the message box.

vbMsgBoxHelpButton 16384 Adds Help button to the message box.

vbMsgBoxSetForeground 65536 Specifies the message box window as the foreground

window.

vbMsgBoxRight 524288 Text is right-aligned.

vbMsgBoxRtlReading 1048576 Specifies text should appear as right-to-left reading

on Hebrew and Arabic systems.

The first group of values (0-5) describes the number and type of buttons displayed in the
dialog box; the second group (16, 32, 48, 64) describes the icon style; the third group (0,
256, 512) determines which button is the default; and the fourth group (0, 4096)
determines the modality of the message box. When adding numbers to create a final value
for the buttons argument, use only one number from each group.

７ Note

These constants are specified by Visual Basic for Applications. As a result, the names
can be used anywhere in your code in place of the actual values.
Return values
Constant Value Description

vbOK 1 OK

vbCancel 2 Cancel

vbAbort 3 Abort

vbRetry 4 Retry

vbIgnore 5 Ignore

vbYes 6 Yes

vbNo 7 No

Remarks
When both helpfile and context are provided, the user can press F1 (Windows) or HELP
(Macintosh) to view the Help topic corresponding to the context. Some host applications,
for example, Microsoft Excel, also automatically add a Help button to the dialog box.

If the dialog box displays a Cancel button, pressing the ESC key has the same effect as
clicking Cancel. If the dialog box contains a Help button, context-sensitive Help is provided
for the dialog box. However, no value is returned until one of the other buttons is clicked.

７ Note

To specify more than the first named argument, you must use MsgBox in an
expression. To omit some positional arguments, you must include the corresponding
comma delimiter.

Example
This example uses the MsgBox function to display a critical-error message in a dialog box
with Yes and No buttons. The No button is specified as the default response. The value
returned by the MsgBox function depends on the button chosen by the user. This example
assumes that DEMO.HLP is a Help file that contains a topic with a Help context number
equal to 1000 .

VB ＝ Copy

Dim Msg, Style, Title, Help, Ctxt, Response, MyString

Msg = "Do you want to continue ?" ' Define message.

Style = vbYesNo + vbCritical + vbDefaultButton2 ' Define buttons.

Title = "MsgBox Demonstration" ' Define title.

Help = "DEMO.HLP" ' Define Help file.

Ctxt = 1000 ' Define topic context.

' Display message.

Response = MsgBox(Msg, Style, Title, Help, Ctxt)

If Response = vbYes Then ' User chose Yes.

MyString = "Yes" ' Perform some action.

Else ' User chose No.

MyString = "No" ' Perform some action.

End If

See also
Functions (Visual Basic for Applications)

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