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: Fitting Your Printout on a Page.

Fitting Your Printout on a Page

Written by Allen Wyatt (last updated August 28, 2021)
This tip applies to Excel 97, 2000, 2002, and 2003


I can't tell you how many times I have gone to print a worksheet, only to have the very last column or the very last row spill over onto another page. This not only wastes paper, but it is very frustrating.

To get around this, Excel has a handy scaling feature that allows you to specify how many pages you want your printed output to occupy. You set the page dimensions, and Excel shrinks everything down so it fits in the specified area. To take advantage of this feature, follow these steps:

  1. Set up your worksheet as desired.
  2. Choose Page Setup from the File menu. Excel displays the Page Setup dialog box.
  3. Make sure the Page tab is selected. (See Figure 1.)
  4. Figure 1. The Page tab of the Page Setup dialog box.

  5. Select the Fit To option and use the associated controls to specify how many pages you want the output to occupy.
  6. Click on OK.
  7. Print your worksheet as normal.

One of the tricks I often use is to set the Fit To controls to 1 page wide by 99 pages tall. In this way, I am sure the output will fit on one page across. Since my output isn't over 99 pages in length, no shrinking is done on this dimension. I end up with output that is 1 page wide by how ever many pages long Excel needs to print.

ExcelTips is your source for cost-effective Microsoft Excel training. This tip (3033) 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: Fitting Your Printout on a Page.

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 Views

Want to see how your document will look before it's printed? Or, do you want to see what things will look like if you put ...

Discover More

Exporting Black and White Charts

Excel's charts are normally created in color, but you can print them in black and white. You may be looking for a way to ...

Discover More

Ensuring Rows and Columns are Empty

Before you go about deleting rows and columns helter-skelter, it is a good idea to determine if there is anything in the ...

Discover More

Program Successfully in Excel! This guide will provide you with all the information you need to automate any task in Excel and save time and effort. Learn how to extend Excel's functionality with VBA to create solutions not possible with the standard features. Includes latest information for Excel 2024 and Microsoft 365. Check out Mastering Excel VBA Programming today!

More ExcelTips (menu)

Specifying Print Quantity in a Cell

When you print a worksheet, you can specify in the Print dialog box how many copies you want printed. If you want the ...

Discover More

Showing Filter Criteria on a Printout

When you print out a filtered worksheet, you may want some sort of printed record as to what filtering was applied to the ...

Discover More

Printing Limited Pages from a Range of Worksheets

Need to print just a few pages from a group of worksheets? The easiest way to handle the task may be through a macro, as ...

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 5 - 5?

There are currently no comments for this tip. (Be the first to leave your comment—just use the simple form above!)


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.