As soon as you open Excel, you’re bound to notice the grid. It’s the series of lines that create the grid that stores all of our data. Rows and columns connect to form cells, with gridlines separating each cell.
So, how do you control gridlines in Excel? Maybe you don’t want to see them all the time, after all. Let’s learn more about gridlines in Excel and how to control them.
Hide and Show Gridlines in Excel
By default, you’re going to see gridlines in Excel. But, you can also turn them off if you want your spreadsheet to be “cleaner” with fewer lines. Find the View menu on Excel’s ribbon, then click on Gridlines to toggle the dividing lines off and on.
That’s all there is to it. This doesn’t actually change the spreadsheet, (such as turning cell borders off or on) it simply alters the spreadsheet’s view options.
How to Make Your Own Gridlines in Excel
If you toggled the gridlines off for a cleaner spreadsheet, you might be asking yourself: “how do I add back some of the gridlines without covering the entire spreadsheet?”
In this case, it helps to use table borders to create our own grid. Take the example below. It’s a clean spreadsheet because it includes plenty of whitespace and doesn’t have too many borders. But, it can be hard to follow data across the page. Let’s use cell borders to create our own gridlines.
First, start by highlighting the data that you wish to surround with borders. Then, click on the dropdown for Borders as you see in the screenshot below. Choose a bordering option, and your data is surrounded with gridlines.
If you want to learn how to print gridlines in Excel, we’ve got you covered with another tutorial. Check out Print Gridlines in Excel to control how the grid shows in a printed or PDF-exported copy.
Subtotals in Excel