How to Print a Large Excel Spreadsheet

When you manage large sets of business data in a Microsoft Excel spreadsheet, you may find the results of your work difficult to print on a single sheet of paper. The choices you make as you make your way through the print process can make the difference between easy-to-read, actionable business information or a chopped-up set of rows and columns that makes little sense. Fine tune your work to optimize your output and save yourself paper, time and printing supplies.

  1. Click on the worksheet tab for the sheet you want to print from your current workbook. You'll find the tabs at the lower left corner of the Excel document interface. Your selected worksheet comes to the front.
  2. Adjust the widths of your data columns to eliminate wasted space and assure that all your cell contents appear. You can drag the right edge of a column header to widen or narrow the column. Set column widths to match their contents by switching to the Home tab of the Excel ribbon and locating its Cells group. Click on the "Format" item and choose "AutoFit Column Width."
  3. Switch to the Page Layout tab of the Excel ribbon and locate the Page Setup group. Click on the "Orientation" item and select either portrait or landscape. For a worksheet with many columns, you may prefer to change the default portrait orientation to landscape.
  4. Switch to the Page Layout tab of the Excel ribbon and locate the Sheet Options group. In the Gridlines section, activate the check box in front of "Print." Unless you activate this setting, the gridlines that define your cell boundaries won't appear on paper, which can make it difficult to follow long rows or columns of data. In the adjacent Headings section of the Sheet Options group, activate the "Print" check to add the column letters and row numbers to your printout.
  5. Switch to the Page Layout tab of the ribbon and locate the Page Setup group. Click on the "Print Titles" item and switch to its Sheet tab. Click on the "Collapse Dialog" button at the right edge of the entry field for "Rows to Repeat at Top" and click on the heading at the beginning of your header row in the spreadsheet itself to add the heading to every page you print. Click on the "Restore Dialog" button -- the context-sensitive version of the Collapse Dialog button -- to return to the dialog box. Use the Collapse Dialog button at the right of the "Columns to Repeat at Left" entry field to return to the spreadsheet so that you can click on the heading for column A and designate it to print as the first column on every page of your multi-page printout.
  6. Switch to the View tab of the Excel ribbon and locate the Workbook Views group. Click on the "Page Break Preview" item to view how your worksheet will print to your currently selected printer. Scroll through your data and evaluate where the page breaks fall; these places are defined by blue boxes that enclose individual pages. If you see awkwardly located page breaks, drag the blue line up or down to adjust them. To add a page break, select the row after the location you want to appear at the top of a new page and right-click on it. From the menu that opens at your cursor, choose "Insert Page Break."
  7. Click on the File tab to bring up Backstage view. Choose "Print" and preview your worksheet as it will print to the printer that's currently selected. Use the Next Page and Previous Page buttons to navigate through a multi-page printout.
  8. Click on the "Show Margins" button at the bottom of the preview window to display the location and width of your margins. You can drag the margins or column widths to adjust them while you're in print preview.
  9. Click on the "Print" button to send your document to the current printer. If you're happy with its printed appearance, save your file to preserve your setup choices with it.

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