Let’s say you are working on a sheet in which you have access to some data. And what you want is to be able to freeze rows in Google Sheets so as you scroll down or sideways you are able to always have your reference data in front of you.
Well, the good news is that you can freeze rows in Google Sheets. This can easily be done using an option called Freeze panes. Today, we’re going to teach you step-by-step how to use Freeze panes.
Why is it a good idea to freeze rows in Google Sheets
It really depends on why you would want to do it.
But in most cases freezing rows in Google Sheets can help you become more productive when you are dealing with large data. For example, if you have a sheet with multiple rows or columns of data about your customers. You can freeze the first column that has name of your customers while you scroll around rest of your sheet.
It’s actually very simple . Here take a look:

Option 1: Freeze Rows in Google Sheets using Mouse or Trackpad
Follow the simple steps:
- Move your cursor to the top-left corner part of the sheet. There you will see two thick gray lines
- Click on one of the thick gray lines and drag to the point where you want to freeze rows or columns


In the example above you will see that we we have frozen two rows and no columns. However, its totally up to you and you can use the thick gray lines to freeze rows and columns as you please.
There is another process through which you can freeze rows in Google Sheets. However, this will require you to go through a few steps and its not as quick as the previous option.
To freeze rows or columns using Menu go to View > Freeze and select the right option that works for you. Here are the various options available:
- No row
- 1 row
- 2 row
- Up to current row
Or for columns you have
- No column
- 1 column
- 2 column
- Up to current column

How to unfreeze rows and columns in Google Sheets
It’s simple. You can just go back and use the same process to move around the cursor or change the frozen rows and columns to “none” using the menu option.
Looking for more tips? Check out our guides on Google Sheets Formulas, Google Sheets Templates, Google Sheets Dropdown & Google Sheets Checkbox.
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