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Digital Accessibility

Workbook and Sheet Titles in Excel

It's much easier for everybody to understand the purpose of your Excel workbooks and sheets when you give them descriptive titles. 

How to Title your Excel Workbook

The way that you add a Title to your Excel workbook is very similar to how you would title your Word document. The title should provide a quick sense of what data is presented within your workbook.

For example, a workbook that contains multiple data tables about student enrollment at University of South Carolina may simply be titled USC Enrollment.


How to Title your Excel Sheets

Since an Excel workbook may have multiple sheets within it, each sheet should have a descriptive title to uniquely identify it. Sheet titles serve as accessible names for screen reader users who are navigating through the sheet tabs of a workbook, and they also help all users decide whether to interact with the sheet or not.

Microsoft Accessibility Checker will flag your workbook with a warning if you leave a Default Sheet Name in place (e.g., Sheet1).

Screenshot of the Accessibility Checker Results in Excel. One Warning is displayed: Default Sheet Name, Sheet1. Below the results is the text: Why Fix? Default sheet names make navigation through the workbook more difficult for people with disabilities.

To resolve the warning and provide a title for your sheet:

  1. Right-click on the sheet tab.
  2. Select Rename from the context menu.
  3. Type a brief name that describes the sheet's contents (e.g., Enrollment Bar Chart). 

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