Page Setup

Page setup is a term that refers to the way visual elements of the spreadsheet are arranged in
order to control the way the document will appear when printed. It includes margins, page scaling,
page sizing and repeating header rows.

In this session you will:

 learn how to centre data on a page when printed

 learn how to use page break preview
 learn how to remove page breaks
 learn how to set rows as repeating print titles
 learn how to print gridlines
 learn how to scale to a specific percentage
 learn how to fit a printed worksheet into a specific number of pages
Centring your Spreadsheet on a Page
By default, your spreadsheet will print at the top-left of the page, which sometimes may appear off-
balance (the right-hand margin may appear much larger than the left-hand one). Centring your
spreadsheet on the printed page gives similar sized left and right (or even top and bottom, if you
centre it vertically) margins.

To do this:

 Click on the button (Page Layout ribbon) and select Custom Margins… (at the
bottom of the list) to see this window:

 Click to place a tick by Horizontally and/or Vertically and click on OK.

Try this yourself:
 Open the file Centre On Page.
 Press Ctrl & P to see the print preview (see that it’s at the top-left of the page).
 Press Esc to return to the normal view, select the Page Layout ribbon (if not already
selected) and click on the Margins button.
 Select Custom Margins, place a tick by Horizontally, click on OK. Press Ctrl & P again to
see the print preview – this time see equal sized margins left and right.
 Save your changes and close the file.

Using Page Break Preview

Page Break Preview is a special view that helps you rearrange and organise your page breaks. It
zooms out from the worksheet so that you can see more of the pages and see the effect that
changes to margins or formatting changes have on the position of page breaks. There are 2 types
of page break:
 Those inserted by the user (manual page breaks)
 Those created by Excel (automatic page breaks).

The button is on the View ribbon and enables you to see the pages that your information
will be printed on, in a view that enables you to still make changes (e.g. to column widths, cell
contents, etc.), e.g.:
Drag any of the blue dotted/dashed lines up or to the left to move/change an automatic page break
to a manual one.

Try this yourself:

 Open the file Level 2 Car Sales.

 Click on the View ribbon, if necessary, and .

 Drag the first dotted horizontal blue line (probably between rows 50 and 51, but this may
differ due to different local settings) to between 47 and 48. The line should change to a
solid blue line (Manual page break).
 Drag the next dotted line (between rows 97 and 98?) to between 96 and 97.
 Drag the vertical dotted line (between columns G and H?) to between H and I.

 Click on to return to the normal view.

Removing Page Breaks

You can remove individual manual page breaks or all at once.
To remove an individual page break, just select a cell on the row just beneath it (in either Normal

or Page Break Preview view), click on (Page Layout ribbon) and Remove Page Break.

To remove all page breaks, click on and select Reset All Page Breaks.

Try this yourself:

 Continue with the Level 2 Car Sales file.

 Click in any cell in row 48, click on (Page Layout ribbon) and select Remove Page
Break.
 Switch the view to Page Break Preview to see the line has returned to a dashed line
(between rows 56 and 57?).

 Click on and select Reset All Page Breaks to see all of the other lines change &
return to their default place.
 Return to the Normal view.
Setting Rows to Repeat as Page Titles
If a list goes onto a second page (or more), it’s a good idea to have the headings automatically
print at the top of each new page, so the reader can see what the data means. This is easy to set
up, and you can have as many rows as you need (e.g. if your headings are made up with two or
three rows of information, you can display them all).

To do this, open up the Page Setup window, Sheet tab:

There are many ways to do open the above window, including:

 Click on the button in the Page Layout ribbon.

 Click on the button to the right of Page Setup and click on the Sheet tab.

Then set the rows to repeat at the top and/or columns to repeat at the left of each new page by
clicking within the corresponding cell and clicking/dragging to select the row(s)/column(s), e.g.:

Try this yourself:

  Continue with the Level 2 Car Sales file.

 Click on .
 Click next to Rows to repeat at top: and then on any cell in row 3. To get a better view of
the worksheet, you can click on the button to the right of the cell – if you use this option,
click on to get back to this window.
 Click next to Columns to repeat at left: and then drag from any cell in column A to any cell
in column B.
 Click on OK.
 Press Ctrl and P to see the print preview. Note that there are now 9 pages – click on the
arrow to look at each page, they should all have the date and day to the left and the
headings along the top. Press Esc to return to the Page Layout ribbon & view.

Printing Gridlines
The default print setting is to hide the gridlines, making your worksheets look very tidy, but
sometimes more difficult to see what data is on the same row. One way of showing lines between
the cells is to print all gridlines.

All you need to do is place a tick by Print under Gridlines on the Page Layout tab:

Try this yourself:

 Continue with the Level 2 Car Sales file.
 Click to place a tick by Print within Gridlines.
 Press Ctrl and P to see the print preview. Note that all lines are shown, apart from where
text overspills into the next empty cell (e.g. ‘Car Sales’ at the top-left). Press Esc to return
to the Page Layout ribbon & view.

Scaling your Printed Page

You can scale down your printed page to fit a specified number of pages or scale up or down to a
given percentage.

To set it to a specified number of pages, click on the Page Layout tab (if necessary) and use the
drop-down arrow to change the Width: (and/or Height, just below it) from ‘Automatic’ to the
number of your choice:

To scale your printout up or down, change the 100% to the size of your choice.
Try this yourself:
 Continue with the Level 2 Car Sales file.
 To see how it would look on paper before doing anything, press Ctrl and P to see the Print
Preview view.
 Click on Automatic by Width: (Page Layout tab) and change it to 2 pages.
 Press Ctrl and P to see the print preview again. Note that you’re back down to 6 pages.
Press Esc to return to the Page Layout ribbon & view.
 Return to the Level 2 Results file (or reopen it), Sheet3 worksheet. Press Ctrl and P to see
the print preview (then Esc to return to the normal view). Click on the Page Layout tab and
change Scale: to 120%.
 Press Ctrl and P again to see the print preview. Note that it still fits onto 1 page, but fills the
page a bit better. Press Esc to return to the Page Layout ribbon & view.
 Try upping the scale to 125% and having a look in Print Preview. If it fits, leave it, if not take
it back down to 120%.
 Save your changes to the two files.