Sometimes we’ve entered data in a column in Excel, only to realize later that it would be better to have this data in a row, or vise-versa.  Here’s a simple trick to convert any row or set of rows into a column, or vise-versa, in Excel.

Please Note: This is tested in Excel 2003, 2007, and 2010.  Here we took screenshots from Excel 2010 x64, but it works the same on the other versions.

Convert a Row to a Column

Here’s our data in Excel:

We want to change these two columns into rows.  Select all the cells you wish to convert, right-click, and select copy (or simply press Ctrl+C):

Now, right-click in the cell where you want to put the data in rows, and select “Paste Special…”

Check the box at the bottom that says “Transpose”, and then click OK.

Now your data that was in columns is in rows!

This works the exact same for converting rows into columns.  Here’s some data in rows:

After copying and pasting special with Transpose selected, here’s the data in columns!

This is a great way to get your data organized just like you want in Excel.