What is a Pivot Table in Excel?

What is a Pivot Table in Excel?
Last Updated on 12/11/2023
Reading time: 2 minutes

A Pivot Table is a powerful tool that calculates (or aggregates) data very easily in Excel

  1. Select your data

    This step is very important because if your data aren't organized properly, you can't work with a Pivot Table

  2. Drag and Drop the fields

    To create your pivot table, you simply have to drag and drop the fields to the Rows / Columns and Values area

Before creating a pivot table

To create a Pivot table, you need a table of data that complies with the following rules

  • No blank rows or empty columns
  • No total or subtotal rows
  • All the columns must have headers
  • Each header name is unique

The best option is to have raw data without any modifications, like in this example. Maybe such a document looks too simple for a lot of users but it's the only way to work with a pivot table.

Organisation of the data to be use with a pivot table

Creation of a Pivot Table in Excel

To create a pivot table you just have to click on the menu Insert > Pivot Table

Menu Pivot Table

And in the dialog box, you select the source of your data.

Connect your pivot table to a Table

You can indicate the cell range of your data source or the table's name if you have inserted your data into a Table (Insert > Table).

Inserting your data into a Table is the best choice because once your data source is updated, your pivot table will automatically use all your data.

The Pivot table pane

  • Press OK,
  • A new worksheet is added to your workbook
  • A new pane on the right shows all the options to use the pivot table in Excel
Interface of a worksheet ready for Pivot Table

In this pane, you have

  • all the headers of your data source (this is why your data source must have headers)
  • 4 areas to drag and drop the fields of your data source

How to create a pivot table?

It's very easy, you just have to drag and drop the fields you want to display.

In the following example, we want to know the total sales for each country.

  1. Drag the field Country into Rows. All the values in the column Country are not unique.
  2. Drag the field Total into Values
Drag and Drop to create the calculation

Just by dropping the field Total, the pivot table has made the SUM of each country
😃😎👍

The future of the pivot table in Excel

Now with the AI technology, you can create a pivot table with a simple click with Excel 365. This article explains you how to proceed

1 Comment

  1. Mandze Basil
    06/07/2023 @ 23:28

    Hello here
    I'm Basil from Cameroon I wish to say a big thank you for the great job you are doing ,
    please I'll like to have more notes about the pivot table

    Reply

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

What is a Pivot Table in Excel?

Reading time: 2 minutes
Last Updated on 12/11/2023

A Pivot Table is a powerful tool that calculates (or aggregates) data very easily in Excel

  1. Select your data

    This step is very important because if your data aren't organized properly, you can't work with a Pivot Table

  2. Drag and Drop the fields

    To create your pivot table, you simply have to drag and drop the fields to the Rows / Columns and Values area

Before creating a pivot table

To create a Pivot table, you need a table of data that complies with the following rules

  • No blank rows or empty columns
  • No total or subtotal rows
  • All the columns must have headers
  • Each header name is unique

The best option is to have raw data without any modifications, like in this example. Maybe such a document looks too simple for a lot of users but it's the only way to work with a pivot table.

Organisation of the data to be use with a pivot table

Creation of a Pivot Table in Excel

To create a pivot table you just have to click on the menu Insert > Pivot Table

Menu Pivot Table

And in the dialog box, you select the source of your data.

Connect your pivot table to a Table

You can indicate the cell range of your data source or the table's name if you have inserted your data into a Table (Insert > Table).

Inserting your data into a Table is the best choice because once your data source is updated, your pivot table will automatically use all your data.

The Pivot table pane

  • Press OK,
  • A new worksheet is added to your workbook
  • A new pane on the right shows all the options to use the pivot table in Excel
Interface of a worksheet ready for Pivot Table

In this pane, you have

  • all the headers of your data source (this is why your data source must have headers)
  • 4 areas to drag and drop the fields of your data source

How to create a pivot table?

It's very easy, you just have to drag and drop the fields you want to display.

In the following example, we want to know the total sales for each country.

  1. Drag the field Country into Rows. All the values in the column Country are not unique.
  2. Drag the field Total into Values
Drag and Drop to create the calculation

Just by dropping the field Total, the pivot table has made the SUM of each country
😃😎👍

The future of the pivot table in Excel

Now with the AI technology, you can create a pivot table with a simple click with Excel 365. This article explains you how to proceed

1 Comment

  1. Mandze Basil
    06/07/2023 @ 23:28

    Hello here
    I'm Basil from Cameroon I wish to say a big thank you for the great job you are doing ,
    please I'll like to have more notes about the pivot table

    Reply

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *