MacNewbeee

Q: How do I print multiple tabs in excel to one pdf

I am using Excel for Mac 2011 and want to select multiple tabs and have this print to one pdf file.  I can print to a normal printer, and have done this for years on a PC, but the Mac pdf function seperates it into seperate files.  I am happy to buy an aftermarket soeftware program for a reasonable price.

OS X Mountain Lion (10.8.1)

Posted on Sep 14, 2012 4:26 PM

Close

Q: How do I print multiple tabs in excel to one pdf

  • All replies
  • Helpful answers

Page 1 Next
  • by thomas_r.,Helpful

    thomas_r. thomas_r. Sep 14, 2012 4:29 PM in response to MacNewbeee
    Level 7 (30,889 points)
    Mac OS X
    Sep 14, 2012 4:29 PM in response to MacNewbeee

    Questions specific to MS Office products are better asked in the Office for Mac forums. Only some people here use Office, while everyone there does.

  • by Barney-15E,

    Barney-15E Barney-15E Sep 14, 2012 4:35 PM in response to MacNewbeee
    Level 8 (49,737 points)
    Mac OS X
    Sep 14, 2012 4:35 PM in response to MacNewbeee

    Select one end of the tabs, then Shift-click the other to select all the tabs, then print.

    You can also cmd-click on the tabs to individually select and deselect.

  • by MacNewbeee,

    MacNewbeee MacNewbeee Sep 14, 2012 4:45 PM in response to Barney-15E
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Sep 14, 2012 4:45 PM in response to Barney-15E

    this would seem to be the obvioius solutiuon as it has worked on the PC version since at least 1997, but not on a Mac.  It will create a seperate pdf of each and every tab. 

  • by Barney-15E,

    Barney-15E Barney-15E Sep 14, 2012 4:52 PM in response to MacNewbeee
    Level 8 (49,737 points)
    Mac OS X
    Sep 14, 2012 4:52 PM in response to MacNewbeee

    Sorry. Just did it to check it out before posting. It created a single PDF.

    Odd you would assume I just posted garbage without verifying what I posted.

  • by uMofobi,

    uMofobi uMofobi Sep 14, 2012 6:04 PM in response to MacNewbeee
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Sep 14, 2012 6:04 PM in response to MacNewbeee

    Try the following:

     

    1. Select the sheets you want to print by clicking "command" key

    2. Click "File" then "Print"

    3. Under "Print What:" choose "Selection" or "Entire Workbook"

    4. Click PDF

    5. Save as PDF...

     

    This should save the selected sheets into one sigle PDF document.

  • by MacNewbeee,

    MacNewbeee MacNewbeee Sep 14, 2012 7:18 PM in response to Barney-15E
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Sep 14, 2012 7:18 PM in response to Barney-15E

    i would not have posted this without extensive experience, please don't feel slighted.  There are a number of posts about this on other blogs and i am hoping this network might help me solve it. 

     

    I did make one error in my description, as it is true that sigle page documents under seperate tabs will sometimes combine into a single pdf...but not always in my experience. 

     

    I am absolutely certain that multiple page documents under seperate tabs will not combine.  I will also crarify that while all tabs are portrait, they do not have the same fomatting and # of columns. 

     

    Finally, this absolutely does work in Excel 2010 for PC when writing to a pdf writer, the problem seems to be Mac based.  My sense is I need to buy a 3rd party pdf writer that truly acts like a printer with its own drivers, does anyone make this?

  • by Barney-15E,

    Barney-15E Barney-15E Sep 14, 2012 8:02 PM in response to MacNewbeee
    Level 8 (49,737 points)
    Mac OS X
    Sep 14, 2012 8:02 PM in response to MacNewbeee

    Well, there's Acrobat.

     

    Other than that, I would suggest looking at MacUpdate, or possibly the Mac App Store.

     

    Office has a history of bad printing when portrait and landscape are mixed (as I think you were alluding to). Given that, it wouldn't suprise me that you get a split PDF out of Office if the format is different. I know we've run into problems similar to that with Office 2007, at work (not PDFs, just mixed format).

     

    Regardless, you can just open all the documents in Preview, Show all the pages of the first document, then drag the remaining ones into the first one. I think all the page numbers (in the Preview numbering system) get wonky, but you can just print the merged document to PDF and get the numbering straight.

  • by MacKid84,

    MacKid84 MacKid84 Jun 18, 2013 8:36 PM in response to MacNewbeee
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Jun 18, 2013 8:36 PM in response to MacNewbeee

    MacNewbeee -

    Were you ever able to find a solution to this printing problem.  I've been using Excel on both Mac and Windows for ages, and am having the same issue trying to print to a single PDF file.  Would appreciate an update if you were able to find a solution.

  • by Salvatore Costantino,

    Salvatore Costantino Salvatore Costantino Jul 28, 2013 12:48 AM in response to MacNewbeee
    Level 1 (5 points)
    Jul 28, 2013 12:48 AM in response to MacNewbeee

    I will add one more clue: before it worked after did not!

     

    Unfortunately I do not know what and when changed...

     

    Hopefully someone finds a solution!

  • by Some Dude Named Jeff,Helpful

    Some Dude Named Jeff Some Dude Named Jeff Sep 11, 2013 10:50 AM in response to MacNewbeee
    Level 1 (5 points)
    Sep 11, 2013 10:50 AM in response to MacNewbeee

    All the page setup information has to be the same; margins, orientation, scale, header and footer information. If there's any differences, Excel will seperate the tabs into seperate .pdf documents. The easiest way to fix this is to select all tabs and format the page setup all at once. Obviously you'd want to go back and check each tab to make sure it's formatted the way you want.

  • by anneliesfromthesinge,

    anneliesfromthesinge anneliesfromthesinge Jan 13, 2014 6:05 AM in response to MacNewbeee
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Jan 13, 2014 6:05 AM in response to MacNewbeee

    Thanks for this info Jeff.

    Very strange this won't work in the regular way.

    Hopefully it will be fixed.

  • by Macworksbetter,

    Macworksbetter Macworksbetter Mar 11, 2014 7:47 PM in response to Some Dude Named Jeff
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Mar 11, 2014 7:47 PM in response to Some Dude Named Jeff

    I tried this method and had the same results. Select all sheets, go to page set up, save changes. Confirmed all sheets were the same and when I went to save as pdf and got the individual files for each sheet, again.

  • by Eric Root,

    Eric Root Eric Root Mar 13, 2014 12:35 PM in response to Macworksbetter
    Level 9 (69,961 points)
    iTunes
    Mar 13, 2014 12:35 PM in response to Macworksbetter

    Combine them is Preview.

  • by Francis Drouillard,

    Francis Drouillard Francis Drouillard Dec 19, 2014 3:17 PM in response to MacNewbeee
    Level 1 (14 points)
    Desktops
    Dec 19, 2014 3:17 PM in response to MacNewbeee

    I found the answer by Eric Root to be the most helpful. Each tab was created as a separate PDF file, but they were numbered as though they were created as 3 tabs to one PDF file. Afterwards, I used "FIle | Create | Combine Files Into Single PDF ..." to obtain the single PDF I wanted.

Page 1 Next