AutoFit Column Widths and Row Heights in Excel 2010
Changing Column Widths and Row Heights in Excel
There are limits to how big and small you can make columns and rows
in Excel. Column widths and row heights with a value of zero are hidden
in an Excel worksheet. This is the equivalent to using the hide column
or row feature.
Columns can have a maximum width of 255. This number represents the
maximum number of characters a column can hold at the standard font
size. Changing the font, the font size, and adding other characteristics
to the font such as italics and bolding greatly reduce the maximum
number of characters a column can hold. The default size of an Excel
column is 8.43, which correlates to 64 pixels.
Rows can have a maximum height of 409. This number represents the how
many 1/72nds of an inch the row can hold. The default size of an Excel
row is 15, which correlates to 20 pixels or about 1/5th of an inch.
Using Excel’s AutoFit Feature
Suppose in your Excel worksheet you have text in the A1
cell that extends beyond the 8.43 (64 pixels) default column width.
Notice that although the column’s width cannot contain the length of the
text, Excel allows the text to spill over into adjacent columns.
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| Excel 2010 AutoFit Tutorial |
Select Column A, click on the Home tab on the Ribbon, and locate a section of the Ribbon almost all the way to the right labeled Cells. Click on the button titled Format and locate a section of the menu labeled Cell Size. Notice that there are three options for changing the width of a column.
Column Width – This option lets you manually change
the width of a column by typing in a number. This option isn’t useful
because you can more easily accomplish the same thing by simply dragging
the column to your desired size.
AutoFit Column Width – This is the option we want.
This option will change the size of the column to a new size depending
on the length of the contents of the cell in the column that takes up
the most space.
Default Width – This option doesn’t actually change
the width of any columns; it simply changes the default width of the
columns for a particular worksheet.
On the Format button’s menu, select AutoFit Column Width and notice that the width of Column A has changed to contain the length of the text in the A1 cell.
Using Excel 2010’s AutoFit feature you can automatically
change the width of columns and the height of rows in a worksheet to
accommodate different sized text without having to manually change the
width and height values. A real time saver, the AutoFit feature can also make data in your worksheet easier to access and read.
