Please Note: This article is written for users of the following Microsoft Excel versions: 97, 2000, 2002, and 2003. If you are using a later version (Excel 2007 or later), this tip may not work for you. For a version of this tip written specifically for later versions of Excel, click here: Putting Cell Contents in Footers.

Putting Cell Contents in Footers

Written by Allen Wyatt (last updated June 5, 2021)
This tip applies to Excel 97, 2000, 2002, and 2003


1

You may find it helpful to sometime place the contents of a cell into the footer of a worksheet, and to have the footer updated every time the contents of the cell changed. The easiest way to do this is with a macro. The following is an example of a macro that will place the contents of cell A1 into the left side of the footer:

Private Sub Worksheet_SelectionChange(ByVal Target As Excel.Range)
    ActiveSheet.PageSetup.LeftFooter = Range("A1").Text
End Sub

The macro is run every time Excel does its normal recalculation—meaning every time the contents of any cell changes or someone presses F9. If you want the contents to be in a different part of the footer, you can change LeftFooter to CenterFooter, or RightFooter.

To apply any formatting to the footer other than the default you will need to add special formatting codes, and you can also use special data codes that Excel recognizes for headers and footers. Both the special formatting and special data codes are quite lengthy and have been covered in other issues of ExcelTips.

If you are working with a very large worksheet, then changing the footer every time Excel recalculates may unnecessarily slow down your computer. After all, the footer remains invisible to the user until such time as the worksheet is actually printed. In this case, you simply need to rename the above macro to some other name that you would then manually execute as the last step before printing a worksheet.

Note:

If you would like to know how to use the macros described on this page (or on any other page on the ExcelTips sites), I've prepared a special page that includes helpful information. Click here to open that special page in a new browser tab.

ExcelTips is your source for cost-effective Microsoft Excel training. This tip (2522) applies to Microsoft Excel 97, 2000, 2002, and 2003. You can find a version of this tip for the ribbon interface of Excel (Excel 2007 and later) here: Putting Cell Contents in Footers.

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

Understanding Smart Cut and Paste

Editing is generally made easier by a feature that Word calls smart cut and paste. If you prefer, you can turn the ...

Discover More

Using Continued Lines

You can create a special header and footer page numbering scheme by using nested fields. This tip shows an example of how ...

Discover More

Deleting All Tab Stops

Tab stops can be helpful when you want to align text within a paragraph. However, you might also want an easy way to get ...

Discover More

Create Custom Apps with VBA! Discover how to extend the capabilities of Office 365 applications with VBA programming. Written in clear terms and understandable language, the book includes systematic tutorials and contains both intermediate and advanced content for experienced VB developers. Designed to be comprehensive, the book addresses not just one Office application, but the entire Office suite. Check out Mastering VBA for Microsoft Office 365 today!

More ExcelTips (menu)

Creating a Footer

Adding a predefined footer to your worksheets is easy, and it helps convey valuable information when you make a printout. ...

Discover More

Moving Part of a Footer Down a Line

Setting up a single footer line for your printouts is fairly easy. If you want to move part of the footer down a line so ...

Discover More

Ampersands in Headers and Footers

Add an ampersand to the text in a header or footer and you may be surprised that the ampersand disappears on your ...

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.

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 nine more than 9?

2022-11-09 08:52:50

Eder

Thanks a lot, I've been looking for this simple vba command line for a long time, you are my new hero.


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.