Please Note: This article is written for users of the following Microsoft Excel versions: 2007, 2010, 2013, 2016, 2019, and Excel in Office 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: Setting Print Quality.

Setting Print Quality

by Allen Wyatt
(last updated November 24, 2018)

Many printers on the market these days provide a bevy of different features. It is not unusual, for instance, for printers to be able to print on different paper stocks, use different inks, and pull paper from different trays. Some printers even allow you to pick different levels of quality for output.

Print quality is often measured in DPI, or dots per inch. This is a measure of printer resolution and simply means the number of individual ink dots that a printer can produce within a linear inch. Some printer drivers used with Windows allow you to specify which resolution you want to use for a particular print job. If your printer allows you to adjust this setting, you can take advantage of it in Excel in this manner:

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

    4. Figure 1. The Page tab of the Page Setup dialog box.

  4. Use the Print Quality drop-down list to select the resolution of print quality you want to use.
  5. Click on OK.

ExcelTips is your source for cost-effective Microsoft Excel training. This tip (8734) applies to Microsoft Excel 2007, 2010, 2013, 2016, 2019, and Excel in Office 365. You can find a version of this tip for the older menu interface of Excel here: Setting Print Quality.

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. ...

MORE FROM ALLEN

Overcoming Automatic Word Selection

When you select text with the mouse, Word usually selects entire words for you. If you don't want to do this, you can use ...

Discover More

Applying Standard Headers and Footers to a Document

When you attach a template to a document, it doesn't modify the documents headers or footers. This tip provides three ...

Discover More

Hiding Macros

Need to hide some macros in your workbook? There are three ways you can do it, as covered in this discussion.

Discover More

Professional Development Guidance! Four world-class developers offer start-to-finish guidance for building powerful, robust, and secure applications with Excel. The authors show how to consistently make the right design decisions and make the most of Excel's powerful features. Check out Professional Excel Development today!

More ExcelTips (ribbon)

Printing Multiple Worksheets on a Single Page

Got a bunch of worksheets and you want to save paper by printing multiple worksheets on a single piece of paper? There ...

Discover More

Selecting a Paper Size

Excel can print your worksheet on just about any paper size you can imagine. How you select the paper size you want used ...

Discover More

Flipping Landscape Orientation when Printing

When printing a worksheet, you may want to rotate the output on the page to fit a certain orientation. Excel doesn't ...

Discover More
Subscribe

FREE SERVICE: Get tips like this every week in ExcelTips, a free productivity newsletter. Enter your address and click "Subscribe."

View most recent newsletter.

(Your e-mail address is not shared with anyone, ever.)

Comments

If you would like to add an image to your comment (not an avatar, but an image to help in making the point of your comment), include the characters [{fig}] (all 7 characters, in the sequence shown) in your comment text. You’ll be prompted to upload your image when you submit the comment. Maximum image size is 6Mpixels. Images larger than 600px wide or 1000px tall will be reduced. Up to three images may be included in a comment. All images are subject to review. Commenting privileges may be curtailed if inappropriate images are posted.

What is 8 + 2?

There are currently no comments for this tip. (Be the first to leave your comment—just use the simple form above!)

This Site

Got a version of Excel that uses the ribbon interface (Excel 2007 or later)? This site is for you! If you use an earlier version of Excel, visit our ExcelTips site focusing on the menu interface.

Newest Tips
Subscribe

FREE SERVICE: Get tips like this every week in ExcelTips, a free productivity newsletter. Enter your address and click "Subscribe."

(Your e-mail address is not shared with anyone, ever.)

View the most recent newsletter.

Links and Sharing
OUR COMPANY
OUR PRODUCTS
OUR SITES
 

Copyright © 2022 Sharon Parq Associates, Inc.