How to set XLSX cell width with EPPlus?

Question

Hello I have this code where i create an xlsx file and i need to pre set the width of the xlsx sheet cells. The actual problem is that when i open the excell i need to double click on the gap between the columns with the mouse in order to unwrap the columns and revieal the data that is hidden. Is there a way to do this programmaticaly with Epplus?

using (ExcelPackage p = new ExcelPackage())
            {
                String filepath = "C://StatsYellowPages.csv";
                DataSet ds = ExportCSVFileToDataset(filepath, "tblCustomers", "\t");
                //Here setting some document properties              
                p.Workbook.Properties.Title = "StatsYellowPages";

                //Create a sheet
                p.Workbook.Worksheets.Add("Sample WorkSheet");
                ExcelWorksheet ws = p.Workbook.Worksheets[1];
                ws.Name = "StatsYellowPages"; //Setting Sheet's name

                //Merging cells and create a center heading for out table
                ws.Cells[1, 1].Value = "StatsYellowPages";
                ws.Cells[1, 1, 1, ds.Tables[0].Columns.Count].Merge = true;
                ws.Cells[1, 1, 1, ds.Tables[0].Columns.Count].Style.Font.Bold = true;
                ws.Cells[1, 1, 1, ds.Tables[0].Columns.Count].Style.HorizontalAlignment = ExcelHorizontalAlignment.Center;

                int colIndex = 1;
                int rowIndex = 2;

                foreach (DataColumn dc in ds.Tables[0].Columns) //Creating Headings
                {
                    var cell = ws.Cells[rowIndex, colIndex];

                    //Setting the background color of header cells to Gray
                    var fill = cell.Style.Fill;
                    fill.PatternType = ExcelFillStyle.Solid;
                    fill.BackgroundColor.SetColor(Color.Gray);


                    //Setting Top/left,right/bottom borders.
                    var border = cell.Style.Border;
                    border.Bottom.Style = ExcelBorderStyle.Thin;
                    border.Top.Style = ExcelBorderStyle.Thin;
                    border.Left.Style = ExcelBorderStyle.Thin;
                    border.Right.Style = ExcelBorderStyle.Thin;

                    //Setting Heading Value in cell
                    cell.Value = dc.ColumnName;

                    colIndex++;
                }

                foreach (DataRow dr in ds.Tables[0].Rows) // Adding Data into rows
                {
                    colIndex = 1;
                    rowIndex++;
                    foreach (DataColumn dc in ds.Tables[0].Columns)
                    {
                        var cell = ws.Cells[rowIndex, colIndex];
                        //Setting Value in cell
                        cell.Value = dr[dc.ColumnName].ToString();
                        //Setting borders of cell
                        var border = cell.Style.Border;                      
                        colIndex++;
                    }
                }


                //Generate A File with Random name
                Byte[] bin = p.GetAsByteArray();
                string file = "c:\\StatsYellowPages.xlsx";
                File.WriteAllBytes(file, bin);

Eastbound

Answer 1

I find that setting the column widths after I have filled in all the data on the sheet works:

ws.Column(1).Width = 50;

There is also the autoFitColumns method but this ignores cells with formulas and wrapped text so it did not work for me.

ws.Cells["A1:K20"].AutoFitColumns();

Kirimia

I would add that if you want to autofit all the columns in a worksheet do this for (i = 1; i <= ws.Dimension.End.Column; i++) { ws.Column(i).AutoFit(); } – Bertrand

it works but setting different value for example i want to set width of column to 7.86 but it is setting to 7.14 and for 3.5 it is setting to 2.71 – Hedve

A simpler way to autofit all columns is to use: ws.Cells[ws.Dimension.Address].AutoFitColumns() – Moffett

column Width Format Pixels ? – Sporran

I am using EPPlus 4.0.5 and this worked for me: ws.Cells.AutoFitColumns(); just be sure to put that after all the cells are created. – Chromatophore

@MubasharAhmad I second this - when I try to set it to 4, it sets it to 3.29, which turns "2016" into "###". Pretty annoying. – Gaslit

@Jonah: Yeah please see the below answer how you can fix it. – Hedve

Important Note: If you are using a very large export data, explicitly setting each column's width like ws.Column(1).Width = 50; is waaaay faster than using AutoFitColumns. Just a reminder. – Ethyne

Just a reminder: AutoFitColumns() function has some serious performance issues especially exported row count is around 500K – Ethyne

Answer 2

Actual Answer is already marked thats the right way of setting column width but there is one issue that is when document is opened first time in excel, it recalculates columns' width (dont know why) so as i mentioned in comment below the marked answer when i set column width to 7.86 its resets it to 7.14 and 10.43 to 9.7x.

i found following code from this epp reported issue to get the closet possible column width as desired.

//get 7.14 in excel
ws.Column(1).Width = 7.86;

//get 7.86 in excel
ws.Column(1).Width = GetTrueColumnWidth(7.86);

public static double GetTrueColumnWidth(double width)
        {
            //DEDUCE WHAT THE COLUMN WIDTH WOULD REALLY GET SET TO
            double z = 1d;
            if (width >= (1 + 2 / 3))
            {
                z = Math.Round((Math.Round(7 * (width - 1 / 256), 0) - 5) / 7, 2);
            }
            else
            {
                z = Math.Round((Math.Round(12 * (width - 1 / 256), 0) - Math.Round(5 * width, 0)) / 12, 2);
            }

            //HOW FAR OFF? (WILL BE LESS THAN 1)
            double errorAmt = width - z;

            //CALCULATE WHAT AMOUNT TO TACK ONTO THE ORIGINAL AMOUNT TO RESULT IN THE CLOSEST POSSIBLE SETTING 
            double adj = 0d;
            if (width >= (1 + 2 / 3))
            {
                adj = (Math.Round(7 * errorAmt - 7 / 256, 0)) / 7;
            }
            else
            {
                adj = ((Math.Round(12 * errorAmt - 12 / 256, 0)) / 12) + (2 / 12);
            }

            //RETURN A SCALED-VALUE THAT SHOULD RESULT IN THE NEAREST POSSIBLE VALUE TO THE TRUE DESIRED SETTING
            if (z > 0)
            {
                return width + adj;
            }

            return 0d;
        }

Hedve

(1 + 2 / 3) == 1; (7 / 256) == 0; (12 / 256 == 0) – Effects

Answer 3

Mubashar Ahmad's answer helped me, thank you for that. I wanted to include how I used it in my project. I have made it into an extension method and refactored it.

Here is the implementation, which sets the cell width for the first column in the worksheet.

    worksheet.Column(1).SetTrueColumnWidth(28);

Here is the extension method for setting a more accurate column width in EPPlus Excel files, note that this method must be inside of a static class:

    public static void SetTrueColumnWidth(this ExcelColumn column, double width)
    {
        // Deduce what the column width would really get set to.
        var z = width >= (1 + 2 / 3)
            ? Math.Round((Math.Round(7 * (width - 1 / 256), 0) - 5) / 7, 2)
            : Math.Round((Math.Round(12 * (width - 1 / 256), 0) - Math.Round(5 * width, 0)) / 12, 2);

        // How far off? (will be less than 1)
        var errorAmt = width - z;

        // Calculate what amount to tack onto the original amount to result in the closest possible setting.
        var adj = width >= 1 + 2 / 3
            ? Math.Round(7 * errorAmt - 7 / 256, 0) / 7
            : Math.Round(12 * errorAmt - 12 / 256, 0) / 12 + (2 / 12);

        // Set width to a scaled-value that should result in the nearest possible value to the true desired setting.
        if (z > 0)
        {
            column.Width = width + adj;
            return;
        }

        column.Width = 0d;
    }

Carapace

Be aware that you should fix those integer fractions inside the math rounding (e.g. 1 / 256, 7 / 256, 12 / 256 and 2 / 12 should become 1D / 256, 7D / 256, 12D / 256 and 2D / 12). Sadly stackoverflow doesn't allow me to edit the answer saying the "Suggested edit queue is full" – Leathers

Answer 4

You can change the default width of all columns in the worksheet by simply changing its DefaultColWidth property:

worksheet.DefaultColWidth = 25;

Grover

Answer 5

There is an easier way. Excel will quantize the passed in column widths to display 12ths below 1 and into 7ths above. This means a staircase result and many end values cannot be made (e.g. 3.5,4.5 etc).

To pre-compensate a width the following is sufficient.

IF DesiredWidth < 1 then

AdjustedWidth = 12/7 * DesiredWidth

ELSE

AdjustedWidth = DesiredWidth + 5/7

ENDIF

Write Worksheet.Column(i).Width = AdjustedWidth with EPPLUS

This is a monotonic adjustment and Excel does all of the quantizing on open/save.

Colchicine