Freeze Panes in Excel: keep the heading row in view

Scroll down a long sheet and the headings vanish. Freeze Panes pins them to the top.

Freeze the top row

1. Go to the View tab.
2. Click Freeze Panes › Freeze Top Row.

Scroll down — row 1 stays. A thin grey line marks the frozen edge.

Freeze the first column

View › Freeze Panes › Freeze First Column. Useful when names are in column A and there are many columns to the right.

Freeze both, or more than one row

1. Click the cell just below the rows and just right of the columns you want frozen. For two heading rows and one name column, click B3.
2. View › Freeze Panes › Freeze Panes.

Everything above and to the left of the cell you clicked stays put.

Unfreeze

View › Freeze Panes › Unfreeze Panes.

Check it worked

Press Ctrl + End to jump to the bottom. The headings should still be visible at the top.

Common mistake

Freezing while scrolled halfway down. Excel freezes from the current view, so rows above the screen disappear for good until you unfreeze. Press Ctrl + Home first, then freeze.

Printing

Freeze Panes only affects the screen. To repeat headings on every printed page use Page Layout › Print Titles.