Microsoft Excel can contain thousands of rows. As you scroll down, or across on any Excel spreadsheet, you may often lose track of which column or row were you working on.
The header of the column, or the first column, which often contains a product or employee name is hidden out of sight as you scroll down or across, creating a sense of loss, specially on large datasets.
It is extremely easy to stay in focus by keeping the top row, or the first column or two always visible.
This way, you won’t be lost, and you can always get a bearing of the current row or column heading.
Check out the easy steps to freeze or unfreeze rows or columns in any Microsoft Excel workbook.
Freeze Panes Menu in Excel under the View Tab
How to Freeze Top Row in Excel
To Freeze the top row, simply go to the View Tab, and find the Freeze Panes Command.
View > Freeze Panes > Freeze Top Row
You will see a thin Grey line between Row 1 & 2. This marks the header row as the fixed, frozen row, and all the column headers will stay in position as you scroll down.
How to Freeze Top Two Rows in Excel
To freeze the top two rows in Excel, you can click on cell A3 (the first cell of the third row). Then go to the Freeze Panes option on the View Tab.
View > Freeze Panes > Freeze Panes
The thin grey line will appear just below the second row. This denotes that the first 2 rows are now frozen in Excel.
How to Freeze Multiple Rows in Excel
To freeze multiple rows in Excel, we can follow a similar procedure. Identify the number of rows to freeze. Go to the next row, after the number of rows to be frozen.
Then go to the View tab, and pick Freeze Panes.
View > Freeze Panes > Freeze Panes
The short cut key is Alt W F F
The thin grey line will appear just below the second row. This denotes that the first 2 rows are now frozen in the Excel sheets.
So to freeze the Top 5 rows, go to cell A6. Then Freeze Panes.
And to freeze the Top 10 rows, you will go to cell A11 before freezing the panes. Hope you get the idea!
How to Freeze First Column in Excel
To freeze first column in Excel (Column A), you can select cell B1 (the first cell of the second, B column). Then go to
View > Freeze Panes > Freeze First Column
The thin grey line will appear just after the first column, between column A & column B. This denotes that the leftmost column (column A) is now frozen in Excel. A frozen Column won’t move as you scroll horizontally.
As you move to other columns and scroll further, the first column is always visible.
How to Freeze First Two Columns in Excel
To freeze the two left most columns in Excel, you can click on cell C1 (the first cell of the third column). Then go to the Freeze Panes Drop-down menu.
View > Freeze Panes > Freeze Panes
The thin grey line will appear just after the second column, between col B & col C. This denotes that the first 2 columns are now frozen in Excel.
As you move to other columns and scroll further, the first two columns of A & column B stay put.
How to Freeze Rows and Columns in Excel
It is extremely easy to freeze specific Rows and Columns in Excel. Simply click on any cell, even in the middle of data. Go to the Freeze Panes Menu under the View Tab in Excel. Then choose Freeze Panes.
Then go to View > Freeze Panes > Freeze Panes.
The cells above and on the left of the currently active cell are frozen. As you move down, or across, the top left section of the frozen cells stays in place, and does not move. The frozen rows are all on the top of the thin grey line. Cells on the right of the column will be able to scroll.
How to Freeze Top Row and First Column in Excel
When you have a lot of data analysis to do in a Excel file, it is a good idea to freeze the Column headers in the first row in Excel window. To Freeze the top row (first row) and the first column, simply go to
View > Freeze Panes > Freeze Top Row.
View > Freeze Panes > Freeze First Column.
These two commands freeze the top row with the column headings and the first column (Column A) instantly.
How to UnFreeze the Top Row in Excel
A frozen pane can be unfreezed easily too. To unfreeze the top row in Excel, simply go to View > Freeze Panes > Unfreeze Panes
The first row is no longer frozen. You can now freely move to any row or column in Excel.
How to Unfreeze the First column in Excel
To unfreeze the first column in Excel, simply go to
View > Freeze Panes > Unfreeze Panes
The keyboard shortcut key is Alt W F F.
The first column is no longer frozen. Test it out.
TIP: If you format your data set as an Excel Table, you will automatically get a table where the top row is always visible.
Excel does this by promoting the column Headers to the Column Letters. Amazing features of Excel help in data management.
It is even available in previous versions of the Excel spreadsheet application, and even on Excel online.
With these simple tips available in the amazing Excel Feature set, you can freeze the top row, the first column, any number of rows on the top, any number of columns on the left, and similarly unfreeze rows and columns in large spreadsheets.
Freezing and unfreezing panes feature makes it a breeze to navigate easily in Excel.
Hope this step-by-step guide helps you in working with extensive datasets in Microsoft Office files.
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Cheers,
Vinai Prakash
Founder, ExcelChamp.Net
