Knowledge Base

XL97: Pasting in Merged Cell Duplicates Copied Cells

Article ID: 161688

Article Last Modified on 10/31/2000

Microsoft Excel 97 Standard Edition

This article was previously published under Q161688

SYMPTOMS

When you copy and then paste cells in a merged cell, Microsoft Excel may remove the merge cell formatting (unmerges the cell) and duplicate the contents of the copied cells in the unmerged cells.

CAUSE

This behavior may occur when the following conditions are true:

You select a range of cells and click Merge And Center on the Formatting toolbar. -and-
You select other (unmerged) cells that contain data and click Copy on the Edit menu. -and-
You click the merged cell and click Paste on the Edit menu.

STATUS

This behavior is by design in Microsoft Excel 97.

MORE INFORMATION

You can create a merged cell by combining two or more selected cells. Microsoft Excel places the data in the upper-leftmost cell of the selection in the resulting merged cell. The upper-left cell contains the value or formula for the merged cells.

In order to copy data into a merged cell, the copied range must have the same number of columns or rows as the range of cells that you merged, or the copied range must be a single cell. For example, if you merge cells A1:B3, you cannot copy cells C1 and C2 in the merged cell because the number of rows in the copied range do not equal the number of rows in the cells you merged. However, you can copy cells C1 and D1 in the merged cell. Microsoft Excel duplicates the contents of the copied cells in the cells that comprised the previously merged cell.

When you copy multiple cells and paste them in a single merged cell, the formatting in the destination cell (merged cell) is replaced by the formatting of the copied cell. The information that you copy from the source cell is duplicated in the cells in the destination cells (the previously merged cell). For example, if you copy two cells and paste them in a cell that you merged from four cells, the contents appear twice to fill the number of cells in the destination range.

For additional information about merging cells, please see the following articles in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:

157028 XL97: Pasting Merged Cells May Clear Cells in Destination

156446 XL97: "That Command Cannot Be Used" Inserting Columns or Rows

REFERENCES

For more information about merged cells, click the Index tab in Microsoft Excel Help, type the following text

merging, cells

and then double-click the selected text to go to the "Merge cells to span several columns or rows" topic.

Additional query words: XL98

Keywords: kbualink97 kbprb KB161688