How To Make Text Vertical In Google Sheets

Last Updated on October 31, 2023 by Jake Sheridan

How To Make Text Vertical In Google Sheets

Have you ever wondered how to create vertical text in Google Sheets?

Vertical text can be useful if you need to save space in your spreadsheet or you might simply want to display text vertically for aesthetic purposes.

Google Sheets offers a lot of formatting tools to help you fully customize your spreadsheets.

One of the less-used formatting options that can still be very useful is the Vertical or Stacked Text formatting option.

Google Sheets Vertical Align (in 3 Steps)

Here’s how to apply it to cells in your spreadsheet:

Step 1

Select the cell or cells you want to format with vertical text

Step 2

Open the format menu, then hover over the Text Rotation submenu, then choose the Stack Vertically option

Step 3

Your text will be formatted with the characters stacked vertically from top to bottom

But what if you don’t want your text to be vertical anymore…

Unstacking Text (Super Easy)

If you’re working in a spreadsheet with vertical text that you no longer want, follow these steps to remove the vertical formatting

Step 1

Select the cell(s) you want to make horizontal

Step 2

Open the format menu, then hover over the Text Rotation submenu, then choose the None option at the top

Step 3

Your text will display horizontally again

How To Rotate Text In Google Sheets

Here’s how to rotate text in Google Sheets.

Step 1

First, select the cell or range of cells you want to convert into vertical text.

In the example above, we have several row headers in the range B2:B13 that we want to display as vertical text.

Step 2

Click on the Text Direction icon in the Google Sheets toolbar.

Step 3

Select the Rotate up if you want the text to be read upwards.

The text formatting will automatically apply to the selected range.

This option is also a good way to label column headers as well since it allows you to display more information in a smaller space.

Step 4

Users can also choose the Rotate down option if they want the text to be read going down.

The result is similar to the Rotate up option but rotated 180 degrees.

Step 5

Users can also choose to stack letters vertically.

Each letter in the text will occupy a new line rather than being read as a single word.

Step 6

If you want to convert the vertical text back into regular text, you can click on the None option to revert the applied formatting.

You may make a copy of this example spreadsheet to test it out on your own.

Summary

Example Spreadsheet: Make a copy of the example spreadsheet

In this tutorial, I covered how to make text vertical in Google Sheets. Want more? Check out all the Google Sheets Tutorials.