Excel: Error Message with Paste Special Transpose

 Last reviewed: November 7, 1994
Article ID: Q79626

The information in this article applies to:

  • Microsoft Excel for Windows, version 2.x, 3.0, 4.0, 4.0a, 5.0
  • Microsoft Excel for OS/2, version 2.2, 3.0

SUMMARY

You may receive the following error message when you attempt to use the Paste Special Transpose command in Microsoft Excel: 

   Copy and Paste Areas Are Different Shapes
This error may occur even though you may have selected a single cell as the paste range. Check to see whether the copied range can fit into the proposed paste range.

MORE INFORMATION

Microsoft Excel spreadsheets have 256 columns and 16,384 rows. If you copy information from 257 rows and attempt to transpose and paste that information, the error always occur because the pasted information now exceeds the 256-column limit. Similarly, if you copy 256 rows, then choose Paste Special from the Edit menu and select the Transpose option with cell B1 currently selected, the same error message results.

Note: this error message is not specific to the Transpose function.

KBCategory: kbfasttip
KBSubcategory:

Additional reference words: 2.1 2.10 2.2 2.20 2.21 3.0 3.00 4.0 4.00 4.0a
4.00a 5.0 5.00

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Last reviewed: November 7, 1994
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