Both for a billing table and for customer lists, in Excel it is possible to improve the display of the contents with continuous numbering. However, Excel does not offer a direct button to apply automatic numbering, so you have to know how to do it. Next, we explain the easiest ways to number rows and cells in Excel..
Excel offers two methods for numbering rows and improving the clarity of tables. On the one hand, the fill handle provides the ability to create continuous or user-defined rows of figures, and on the other, the ROW function allows you to determine numbering with a formula.
The fill handle or automatic fill handle is at the lower right edge of a cell when we hover the mouse cursor over it. To mark multiple cells, click on a cell and drag the box down while holding down the fill handle in the right corner..
The fill handle is the simplest way to insert continuous numbering into the rows of a table. There is the possibility of marking the pattern that the numbering should follow.
Step 1 . If you want the numbering to be ascending (1, 2, 3, 4?), You just have to enter the numbers 1 and 2 in the first cells of the column. Excel always requires two to three figures to automatically recognize the desired pattern and continue it. Mark the area that contains the numbers. Make sure not to check the little green box in the lower right corner, but to click on the cell and drag the frame to the end of the corresponding row..
Step 2 . Now hover over the little green rectangle at the bottom right edge of the cell. Drag it to the end of the area you want to number.
Step 3 . Excel then completes the continuous numbering.
You can also number with odd numbers or in jumps of 10, 20 or 100 units. You just have to indicate what increment intervals you want, Excel takes care of the rest.
It uses numbering and autofill for other purposes as well, eg. eg, to automatically fill in date or time information. For the program to understand what you want to do, you only have to enter two or three examples. The program recognizes the pattern automatically.
As an alternative to the fill handle, you can use the ROW function to number rows in Excel automatically. The syntax for the ROW function looks like this:
=FILA([REFERENCIA DE CELDA])
The ROW function returns the row number of the reference that is entered between parentheses? () ?. Enter in the formula, for example, B5 .
=FILA(B5)
Press [Enter]. The function returns 5, since this is row 5 in column B.
Note that you must determine the cell reference. If you leave the reference empty, the ROW function automatically indicates the number of the row in which the function is located.
Now we want to use the ROW function for automatic numbering.
Step 1. Enter in the first row the function ROW with the reference of the row where you want to start. If you start at A1, enter = ROW (A1) .
Press [Enter]. Now a 1 appears in cell A1.
Step 2 . Now drag the fill handle again to the end of the desired area. The ROW function then adds a continuous numbering.
If after adding the ROW function you modify the data or move or delete lines, the numbering may be interrupted. To update it again, mark two of the existing numbers in the numbering and drag the fill handle over the broken area.
Step 3 . Do you want the ROW function to start with the number 1 in another row ? This is also very simple: go to the cell where the numbering should start, e.g. ex. B3. Enter the ROW function and subtract the number of rows left empty above the beginning of the numbering. In syntax form, the formula looks like this:
=FILA([REFERENCIA DE CELDA])-número de celdas
The ROW function now starts the numbering with 1 in row B3, since B1 and B2 have been subtracted from the numbering:
Drag down again with the fill handle. The ROW is numbered automatically .
Do you want to keep improving the design of your data sheets? There are countless tricks to formatting a table in Excel.