Autofit Height for Selected Cells Only

[jqavins]

Back in 2003 one could select just a few cells and use autofit row height for the selected cells only. It might come out too small for other cells in the row, but sometimes that doesn't matter (such as when the cells that don't fit are hidden or excluded from the print area). I can't find how to do this in Excel 2013. Did the geniuses at Microsoft take this capability away, or just hide it?

 

[DRSteele]

No, the geniuses had other clever things in mind.

As far as I've ascertained, this is how it works. If you select any row/column header by clicking, then CTRL-clicking other row/column headers, and then select Autofit RowHeight/ColumnWidth, Excel will auto-fit the height/width to the largest cell in those selected rows/columns.

On the other hand, if you select any cell by clicking, then CTRL-clicking other cells, and then select Autofit RowHeight/ColumnWidth, Excel will auto-fit the height/width to the largest cell in those selected cells of the respective rows/columns. If you select a blank cell as one of them, Excel will not change that row/column.

 

[jqavins]

Nope, just tried it (again). There is large text in F22 which I don't really care about. I want to set the row height based on C22 instead. I select C22 and then use AutoFit Row Height, and it sizes to F22. To follow your instructions to the letter, I manually shrunk the row, then selected C22 again, then Ctrl-clicked D22; D22 contains something even smaller, but is not blank. Again, AutoFit Row Height sized the row to F22.

In short, the command always behaves as if I had selected the entire row no matter what I have actually selected.

 

[DRSteele]

It sets the height/width to the largest cell, F22. If you wish to have the height of Row22 be the height of C22, you will have to do that manually.

 

[jqavins]

So they did take that ability away. In Excel 2003 I could select C22 and pick "Fit row Height to Selection" and get what I'm after. Oh, well, another victim of progress.

 

[DRSteele]

Instead of complaining, going here and making a lucid suggestion would be more constructive. I personally have never needed it and I don't miss it, but I grant that the feature might be useful to you in your particular workbook. Others might vote for your idea and MS will consider adding the functionality if enough do. Just sign up and go to 'Post a new idea'.

https://excel.uservoice.com/forums/304921-excel-for-windows-desktop-application

Best of luck.