If You Don't Rename Tables in Excel, Today's the Day to Start

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• Why should tables be named in Excel
• How to name a table in Excel
• Excel table naming rules and techniques

By default, tables in Excel are named Table1, Table2, Table3, and so on. However, you don't have to stick to these tags. In fact, it would be better if you don't! In this quick guide, I will explain why you should always rename tables in Excel and show you how to do this.

Why should tables be named in Excel

While it may take some time to develop the habit of naming tables in Excel (if you don't usually do this), the following reasons indicate that today should start.

First, if you are working on a large workbook with multiple tables, you can quickly navigate from one table to another by clicking the down arrow in the Name box (located in the upper left corner of the Excel window) - no matter which worksheet they are located in. If you do not name the table, this drop-down list will display the default Table numeric table name, which means you cannot take advantage of this time-saving trick.

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Article Second, descriptive table names make it easier for people using screen readers to understand what each table contains.

Third, formulas containing references to renamed tables are easier to understand and debug than formulas that reference default table names. For example, quoting T_Profit[Profit] in a formula is more contextual than quoting Table1[Profit], and if the calculation seems to be incorrect, you know where to fix any issues. More importantly, referencing table names in formulas reduces the possibility of accidentally referencing wrong cells or ranges.

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At the end of the article , many Excel tools, such as pivot tables and charts, work effectively using table names, so assigning these tags to the data will improve the overall performance of the worksheet.

How to name a table in Excel

If this is your first time naming a table in Excel, you'll be surprised at how simple the process is.

The first step is to make sure your data has been formatted as an Excel table. In other words, while you can put numbers into a spreadsheet and leave the data as is, Excel has a tool that allows you to link these cells together as a grouping range.

Select any cell in the range you want to convert to a table, and on the Ribbon, on the Start tab, click Format as Table, and select the design that suits you.

Excel Table Naming Rules and Tips Before you continue to rename Excel tables, please note the following naming rules and tips:

• The table name must begin with a letter, an underscore (_) or a backslash ().
• The remaining characters in the table name must be letters, numbers, periods, or underscores.
• Tables cannot be named "C", "c", "R" or "r".
• The table name cannot be a cell reference, such as A1 or $B$2.
• Each table name in the workbook must be unique.
• Keep the table names as short as possible while making sure they clearly define what the table contains. Table names can contain up to 255 characters, but if you are worried about this, your table names must be too long!
• Table names cannot contain spaces. If the table name consists of multiple words, separate the words with an underscore or period.
• To distinguish my table from the name box and other elements in the name manager, I usually start with "T_".

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In addition to naming tables in Excel, another way to make spreadsheets easier to navigate and make formulas easier to read is to name individual cells or ranges of cells. This is especially useful if there are cells or ranges of cells in the workbook that you or others know will be used and accessed frequently.

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