How to Modify Rows and Columns in Excel

Key Takeaways

The next level of working with data in Excel is modifying entire rows and columns. Excel provides plenty of features for controlling and editing rows and columns in a worksheet. Let's take a look at some of the functionality available. To insert a new column, click on a cell in the column to the right of where you want the new column to appear. Or to insert a new row, click on a cell in the row below where you want the new one to appear. Next, click home, then insert, and choose what to insert. Notice that you can also insert individual cells from this menu. You can also access these options by right-clicking on the chosen cell and selecting insert from the menu. The insert dialogue box will appear where you can choose to insert a row above the selected cell, a column to the left of the selected cell, or an individual cell with the option of shifting the existing cells down or to the right. Deleting rows and columns works in the same way using the delete commands available on the home tab in the sales group and the right-click menu. Sometimes it will be necessary to change the size of a row or column in order to display all the data in the cell. You also might want to change the size of a row or column just for appearance. In either case, resizing a row or column is quite easy. To change the size of a column, place your mouse pointer on the line that divides the column headers. For example, if you wanted to change the size of column C, you would place your mouse pointer on the line separating C and D. Your cursor will turn into a vertical line with a small arrow on either side. When you see this pointer, click and hold the left mouse button to drag the column edge to the left or right. As you drag, you will see the size in pixels. When you release your mouse, the size of the column will be changed. To change the size of a row, place your pointer on the line separating the row headers and then click and drag up or down to make the row larger or smaller. To automatically fit a column or row to its contents, double click the separator. There are more resizing commands available by clicking home then format. The two auto fit commands will automatically size the row or columns to their contents. The row height and column width commands will open a dialogue box where you can enter the desired dimensions. Excel also gives you the ability to temporarily hide rows and or columns and then unhide them when necessary. This is useful for reducing the width of very large spreadsheets to make it easier to read. However, you should note that if a column or row is hidden, they won't appear if the sheet is printed. To begin, select the row or column that you want to hide. Next, click home, then format, and then hide and unhide, and choose the desired option. In this example, column B is hidden. To reshow it, we would reselect the surrounding columns and click home, then format, then hide and unhide, and finally unhide columns. The column would then reappear as normal. Excel also enables you to clear the data from cells rather than deleting the cells entirely. You can do so by clicking the drop- down arrow on the clear command in the editing group of the home tab. You can then choose from several available options. Each clear option produces a different result. The clear all option clears all contents, formats, and comments that are contained in the selected cells. The clear formats option clears only the formats that are applied to the selected cells. The clear contents option clears only the contents in the selected cells, leaving formats and comments in place. The clear comments and notes option clears any comments or notes attached to the selected cells. And the clear hyperlinks option clears any hyperlinks attached to the selected cells. You can also select a row or column from its header, right click, and select delete. However, please be aware that this removes the row or column and the content completely.