Please Note: This article is written for users of the following Microsoft Excel versions: 2007, 2010, 2013, 2016, 2019, and Excel in Microsoft 365. If you are using an earlier version (Excel 2003 or earlier), this tip may not work for you. For a version of this tip written specifically for earlier versions of Excel, click here: Excel Refuses to Put Page Breaks between Subtotal Groups.

Excel Refuses to Put Page Breaks between Subtotal Groups

Written by Allen Wyatt (last updated September 14, 2019)
This tip applies to Excel 2007, 2010, 2013, 2016, 2019, and Excel in Microsoft 365


Sandy noted that when she inserts subtotals into her worksheet, she usually clicks the insert page break between groups button. It doesn't seem, however, that the page breaks are inserted. When Sandy looks at the worksheet in both Print Preview and Page Break Preview, Excel does not show the page breaks as being present.

The only time that this behavior should occur is if you direct Excel (in the Page Setup options) to fit the printout to a specific number of pages. You can check to see if this is the case in this manner:

  1. Display the Page Layout tab of the ribbon.
  2. Click the small icon at the lower-right corner of the Page Setup group. Excel displays the Page Setup dialog box.
  3. Make sure the Page tab is displayed. (See Figure 1.)
  4. Figure 1. The Page tab of the Page Setup dialog box.

  5. Make sure the Adjust To option is selected and set to 100%.
  6. Click OK.

The reason that you need to make this change is that if you have your page setup configured to fit your printout to a specific number of pages, Excel basically ignores any page breaks in your worksheet.

ExcelTips is your source for cost-effective Microsoft Excel training. This tip (8702) applies to Microsoft Excel 2007, 2010, 2013, 2016, 2019, and Excel in Microsoft 365. You can find a version of this tip for the older menu interface of Excel here: Excel Refuses to Put Page Breaks between Subtotal Groups.

Author Bio

Allen Wyatt

With more than 50 non-fiction books and numerous magazine articles to his credit, Allen Wyatt is an internationally recognized author. He is president of Sharon Parq Associates, a computer and publishing services company. ...

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