Excel Tip – Learn how to print multiple sheets to a single PDF file and not many separate PDF files you have to combine into one.

If you have ever tried to print a large Excel workbook to a PDF file, you’ve probably run into this issue. You press print, Excel asks you to name the PDF, and then it begins to print. Everything seems fine, but then Excel asks you to name another PDF, then another, then another, ad infinitum. When the operation finally finishes, Excel has properly printed the workbook to a PDF format, but your worksheets have been split into several different PDF files. Some PDFs contain multiple worksheets, others only a single one, but all you really wanted was one PDF file with the entire workbook.

It turns out this issue is caused by having different Page Setup options on each worksheet. For example, Excel can’t print two pages with different paper sizes to the same “piece of paper” (actually a PDF in this case). Instead, it insists on having two different PDFs to print to, one for each paper size. So, to resolve this issue, you must make sure each worksheet’s page setup agrees with the others.

Another resolution if you don’t want to check the individual page setups, or make a change like this with all the tabs highlighted, would be to use the Acrobat Excel add-in and choose the create PDF option. See your IT person to get this add-in.

(partial credit to Helen Bradley projectwoman.com)