Why does excel change the column widths when printed or viewed in page layout workbook view?

Question

I need my excel document cells to be square in normal view and when printed, but excel changes the width of the columns when printed or when viewed in the page layout view.

Normal View:

Page Layout View:

I can change the width in the page layout view to make the cells square when printed, but this messes up the width of the normal view. Is there any way to fix this issue?

Answer 1

Hi

My name is André. I am an independent consultant to Microsoft.

Depending on the fonts you use, column widths and line heights may be displayed differently when you print or view a spreadsheet in print preview. This behavior occurs when you use proportionally spaced fonts, such as a proportional TrueType font. This problem does not occur when you use uniformly spaced fonts (fonts with fixed widths), such as Courier New. The discrepancy in font metrics is a function of how Microsoft Windows reports font information to Microsoft Excel.

To work around the problem with the column width, use any of the following methods.

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1- Select the cells that contain the data. On the Format menu, click Cells.

2 - In the Format Cells dialog box, click the font tab and select a monospace font, such as Courier New.

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1 - Drag the border on the right side of the column title until the column is the desired width. -or-select the column you want to resize, point to column in the Format menu and click width. Enter a smaller number and click OK.

2 - On the file menu, click print preview to view the page.

3 - Repeat steps 1 and 2 as needed until the column is displayed correctly.

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1- Press CTRL + A to select all columns and rows in the workbook.

2 -On the Format menu, click Style.

3 -In the list of style names, click Normal. Then, click Modify.

4 -On the fonts tab, select the correct font (whichever font you are using in the workbook).

5 -Click OK twice.

I hope this information is useful for you. If you still have questions, answer here so I can continue helping you.

If you liked my help, rate it. It's very important to me.

André.

Answer 2

Sadly, this did not fix the issue for me. I don't know if there is a fix for my issue, as I have been researching this issue and not much comes up. The only results I have found are similar to what you have told me.

Answer 3

What happens if you highlight the squares from A to D and down to 4 and then click Print Area, set print area

Answer 4

The Print Area seems to not affect the column width for me. I have discovered when I change the print quality to 1200 or 300 dpi, the column width changes to be closer to what I want, but it's not exactly the right size.

Answer 5

I also discovered that and got it to a point difference, can I ask why you need it exact; I have always sorted my printed first and if it was the same in Excel screen it didn't matter to me, I am just interested what you are using it for.