Why may it become necessary to freeze multiple rows in Excel? For example, to keep column headings always in sight when scrolling. In this article, we’ll tell you how to freeze multiple rows in Excel!
How to freeze the first rows in Excel
To freeze the first row in a document, you should:
- Open an Excel file and go to the “View” tab
- Find the “Freeze Panes” tool on the panel
- Click on it and select “Freeze Top Row”

There is no need to select the row before this action. Excel knows itself which row to be frozen.
After that, you can scroll the document down to infinity, but the top row will always be visible since it has been frozen.
How to freeze multiple rows in Excel
The program allows you to “freeze” not only the top row but also any other rows at a user’s discretion. So how to freeze certain rows in Excel so that they don’t go away while scrolling?
- Tap on the cell below the rows you want to freeze. With this action, you will indicate the software a border to which you need to freeze the rows.
- Go to the “View” tab
- Click the “Freeze Panes” tool and select the topmost option

When you activate the freeze of multiple rows, they will always remain at the top when scrolling through the document.
Please note that you can freeze rows only if they are located at the top of the sheet.
If you plan to “freeze” rows somewhere in the middle of the document, then this will be impossible from a functional point of view.
Before freezing, also make sure that the rows are visible. Invisible lines will be hidden and inaccessible after freezing.
How to unfreeze rows in Excel
From the first part of the article, you learned how to freeze certain rows in Excel. And now, it’s time to talk about how to cancel their freezing. It is very simple.
- Go to the “View” tab
- Pay attention to the same “Freeze Panes” tool. Tap on it.
- A menu of 3 options will pop up. The very first will be “Unfreeze Panes” now.
- Click on this item, and the rows freezing will be canceled.

That is what we need in order to cancel the freeze of rows in Excel.
An alternative way to freeze multiple rows in Excel
If the “Freeze Panes” tool does not suit you for some reason or simply does not work, use the “Split” function. It is located next to the above block.
Unlike “Freeze Panes”, this tool does not freeze rows but splits an Excel sheet into several parts. They cease to depend on each other and become to be scrolled separately.
Let’s try the separation in practice. Select the cell under the rows you want to separate. And click on “Split”.

A separator bar will appear above the selected cell. Try to scroll down, and you will see that the rows remain in place.
To cancel splitting, click on the “Split” item again, after which splitting of rows will be canceled, and the sheet will again become a single whole.
So, you have learned how to freeze the first two rows in Excel or freeze multiple rows in your spreadsheet document. We hope that this instruction will be useful to you for working in Excel!