# Microsoft Office Application Help - Excel Help forum > Excel General >  > [SOLVED] This Operation Requires Merged Cells To Be Identically Sized

## nightdawg

Greetings,

I got a spreadsheet from my boss today and put a filter on it. The problem is the filter is completely useless because the "merged cells need to be identically sized." What in the world does that mean? Merged cells?  The help button says to "unmerge all the merged cells in the range" or "make each group of merged cells the same size as the largest group." I can find absolutely nothing in the spreadsheet that says what a merged cell is or how to "unmerge" a merged cell. 

Thank you for reading this! All I want to do is put a list in alphabetical order. Why did they make it so hard to do that?

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## jeffreybrown

Hello & Welcome to the Board,

Yes merged cells are a bad thing in Excel.  Without seeing your spreadsheet it is hard to say where the merge cells exists, but I found this which should help

http://www.worldstart.com/find-merged-cells-in-excel/

No that you found them...get rid of them.

An alternative to merge cells:

Let's say the merged cells span A1:B1 >> select those cells >> ctrl + 1 >> Alignment tab >> Horizontal: Center Across Selection >> Text Control: Uncheck the Merge cells checkbox

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## Mr Davo

Hi All,

Such a simple solution here, I was worried that I was in for an hour of "Googling", and some serious hair pulling.

Just select all cells in your sheet, by clicking on the top left corner of the sheet - once all cells are selected they will "turn grey".

Then right click anywhere in the "greyed out area" and select "Format Cells" - from there select "Alignment Tab".

Click on "Merge Cells" until the box is empty (e.g. unticked), you may have to tick twice - I did - as the program knew that some cells had been merged and others hand not!

Finally click on "OK" and then perform your data sort as normal.

I wasn't a member of this forum until making the humble discovery above, but I figure sometimes you have to give back.

One final note I am using Office 2010 - hopefully this works on other versions of Office as well.

Kind Regards,

Davo

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## MrJF

Double ditto! thank you, saved my day! (and I registered to say so!)

(Where is "thread tools" to mark this solved?)

FYI - On Excel Mac, after selecting all your cells, you can also get to "format cells" from the menu bar, or type command-1, and then check / uncheck the "merged cells" check box (leave it unchecked).





> Hi All,
> 
> Such a simple solution here, I was worried that I was in for an hour of "Googling", and some serious hair pulling.
> 
> Just select all cells in your sheet, by clicking on the top left corner of the sheet - once all cells are selected they will "turn grey".
> 
> Then right click anywhere in the "greyed out area" and select "Format Cells" - from there select "Alignment Tab".
> 
> Click on "Merge Cells" until the box is empty (e.g. unticked), you may have to tick twice - I did - as the program knew that some cells had been merged and others hand not!
> ...

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## jojomac68

Just wanted to say thanks for help, spent an hour trying to get an answer to this till I googled the error (Yep should have done that sooner).  Thanks Jeff

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## KarenMP

Thank you, Davo and Jeff, you validated my method and gave me confidence to keep at it through a couple of failures!

Kind regards and blessings,

KMP

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## letsgoluwee

> Hi All,
> 
> Such a simple solution here, I was worried that I was in for an hour of "Googling", and some serious hair pulling.
> 
> Just select all cells in your sheet, by clicking on the top left corner of the sheet - once all cells are selected they will "turn grey".
> 
> Then right click anywhere in the "greyed out area" and select "Format Cells" - from there select "Alignment Tab".
> 
> Click on "Merge Cells" until the box is empty (e.g. unticked), you may have to tick twice - I did - as the program knew that some cells had been merged and others hand not!
> ...




You are an angel! This worked! Thank you so much!

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## prairiedawnc

I was able to unmerge the cells in my spreadsheet by following the last instructions posted, but after I performed a sort and expanded the selection, the sorted column no longer corresponded with data in the rows next to it, making the sorting useless. Do the gurus here have any suggestions for me? 

PDC

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