Centering Across Columns

by Allen Wyatt
(last updated January 4, 2021)

1

Excel has a nifty feature that allows you to format your headings to look better on the printed page. You can center the contents of a cell so that it is spread across several columns. For instance, if the body of your worksheet is six columns wide, you can center your headings across all six columns. Applying this type of formatting is very easy:

  1. In the left-most cell of the range in which you want the text centered, enter the text.
  2. Select the range of cells across which you want the text centered.
  3. Click on the Center Across Columns tool on the toolbar.

If you later enter anything in one of the other cells in the range you specified in step X, the centering is effectively canceled. This is because Excel recognizes that centering is impossible to do when there is something "blocking" the way. To recenter, you need to remove the offending cell.

ExcelTips is your source for cost-effective Microsoft Excel training. This tip (1942) applies to Microsoft Excel 97, 2000, 2002, and 2003.

Author Bio

Allen Wyatt

With more than 50 non-fiction books and numerous magazine articles to his credit, Allen Wyatt is an internationally recognized author. He is president of Sharon Parq Associates, a computer and publishing services company. ...

MORE FROM ALLEN

Upside-Down Printing

Putting words on the printed page is easy in Word. Rotating those words in different manners can be a bit trickier. This ...

Discover More

Creating Special, Compound Characters

If you have a need for special characters (particularly in technical documents), Word provides a couple of ways you can ...

Discover More

Tracked Changes Notification when Opening

If you have Word configured to show markup on-screen and you look through a document, it is easy to tell where changes ...

Discover More

Professional Development Guidance! Four world-class developers offer start-to-finish guidance for building powerful, robust, and secure applications with Excel. The authors show how to consistently make the right design decisions and make the most of Excel's powerful features. Check out Professional Excel Development today!

More ExcelTips (menu)

Countering Compressed Columns

If you open a workbook and find that the width of some of your columns has been changed, the discovery can be ...

Discover More

Hiding Columns Not within a Date Range

Want to automatically hide some columns that don't meet a date criteria that you set? You can't do it automatically, but ...

Discover More

Changing Column Width

When creating a worksheet, you often need to adjust the width of columns so your data looks great. Here's how to quickly ...

Discover More
Subscribe

FREE SERVICE: Get tips like this every week in ExcelTips, a free productivity newsletter. Enter your address and click "Subscribe."

View most recent newsletter.

(Your e-mail address is not shared with anyone, ever.)

Comments

If you would like to add an image to your comment (not an avatar, but an image to help in making the point of your comment), include the characters [{fig}] (all 7 characters, in the sequence shown) in your comment text. You’ll be prompted to upload your image when you submit the comment. Maximum image size is 6Mpixels. Images larger than 600px wide or 1000px tall will be reduced. Up to three images may be included in a comment. All images are subject to review. Commenting privileges may be curtailed if inappropriate images are posted.

What is three less than 9?

2017-11-08 12:35:48

Susan Speer

I can't find the Center Across Columns tool, and the Help function doesn't seem to have heard of it. I have Microsoft Office 365 Plus.

Thanks.

This Site

Got a version of Excel that uses the menu interface (Excel 97, Excel 2000, Excel 2002, or Excel 2003)? This site is for you! If you use a later version of Excel, visit our ExcelTips site focusing on the ribbon interface.

Newest Tips
Subscribe

FREE SERVICE: Get tips like this every week in ExcelTips, a free productivity newsletter. Enter your address and click "Subscribe."

(Your e-mail address is not shared with anyone, ever.)

View the most recent newsletter.

Links and Sharing
OUR COMPANY
OUR PRODUCTS
OUR SITES
 

Copyright © 2021 Sharon Parq Associates, Inc.