How to align text vertically in Excel

Let’s take a look.

Here we have a table with several rows of sample text.

The top three rows contain a single line of text.

The bottom three rows contain larger amounts of text.

The options available for vertical alignment in Excel are listed across the top of the table.

Let’s format the text in each column to match the headings.

For column C, we smack the Top Align button.

For column D, we use the Middle Align button.

For column E, vertical alignment is already set to Bottom Align.

So there’s no need to change the setting.

Note that nothing in our table has changed.

That’s because vertical alignment doesn’t actually do anything unless the row height is increased.

Let’s make the first three rows taller.

Now we can see vertical alignment in action.

Vertical alignment prefs are on the Alignment tab, just below the Horizontal alignment menu.

As we can see, both Justify and Distributed automatically wrap text.

With a single line of text, Justify behaves like Top alignment, and Distribute behaves like Middle alignment.