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: Centering Your Worksheet.

Centering Your Worksheet

Written by Allen Wyatt (last updated August 24, 2024)
This tip applies to Excel 97, 2000, 2002, and 2003

If you are working with smaller worksheets, they can look odd when printed. Why? Because Excel normally prints your worksheet data at the upper-left corner of a piece of paper. If the worksheet data is small enough, the placement of the data on the printed sheet can detract from what you are trying to convey.

To help offset this problem, Excel provides a way you can easily center your printed information. You can center the data horizontally, vertically, or both. Follow these steps:

  1. Choose Page Setup from the File menu. Excel displays the Page Setup dialog box.
  2. Make sure the Margins tab is selected. (See Figure 1.)

    3. Figure 1. The Margins tab of the Page Setup dialog box.

  3. Select the Horizontally check box if you want the information centered left-to-right between the margins of the page.
  4. Select the Vertically check box if you want the information centered top-to-bottom between the margins of the page.
  5. Click on OK.

ExcelTips is your source for cost-effective Microsoft Excel training. This tip (2843) 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: Centering Your Worksheet.

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. ...

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