I always forget how to do this. If you have the same problem, here is a quick post for your bookmarks…
Basic commands
%multi-column
\multicolumn{number cols}{align}{text} % align: l,c,r
%multi-row
\usepackage{multirow}
\multirow{number rows}{width}{text}
Using * as width in the multirow command, the text argument’s natural width is used (multirow package documentation).
Multiple columns
\documentclass[11pt]{article}
\begin{document}
\begin{table}[ht]
\caption{Multi-column table}
\begin{center}
\begin{tabular}{cc}
\hline
\multicolumn{2}{c}{Multi-column}\\
X&X\\
\hline
\end{tabular}
\end{center}
\label{tab:multicol}
\end{table}
\end{document}
Multiple rows
\documentclass[11pt]{article}
\usepackage{multirow}
\begin{document}
\begin{table}[ht]
\caption{Multi-row table}
\begin{center}
\begin{tabular}{cc}
\hline
\multirow{2}{*}{Multirow}&X\\
&X\\
\hline
\end{tabular}
\end{center}
\label{tab:multicol}
\end{table}
\end{document}
Multiple rows and columns
\documentclass[11pt]{article}
\usepackage{multirow}
\begin{document}
\begin{table}[ht]
\caption{Multi-column and multi-row table}
\begin{center}
\begin{tabular}{ccc}
\hline
\multicolumn{2}{c}{\multirow{2}{*}{Multi-col-row}}&X\\
\multicolumn{2}{c}{}&X\\
\hline
X&X&X\\
\hline
\end{tabular}
\end{center}
\label{tab:multicol}
\end{table}
\end{document}
The examples provided are very basic. Drop me a comment below in case you are having problems with a more complex table. Also, the color is just for illustration purposes and for simplicity reasons not part of the minimal working examples above. See here for how to color table columns or rows.
Partial horizontal line
Use \cline{columns} for a horizontal line spanning one or several table columns.
\documentclass[11pt]{article}
\begin{document}
\begin{table}[ht]
\caption{Partial horizontal line}
\begin{tabular}{ccc}
\hline
\multicolumn{2}{c}{Multi-column}&\\
\cline{1-2}
X&X&X\\
X&X&X\\
\hline
\end{tabular}
\end{center}
\label{tab:multicol}
\end{table}
\end{document}
December 24th, 2012 at 5:52 pm
Hi,
in the multiple columns and multiple rows examples, are you sure pictures match with code?. I think alignment of “X” is not “c”.
December 25th, 2012 at 10:53 pm
Right, I used a more complex column definition and changed the code to keep it as simple as possible. Also, the color is not reproduced by the example.
April 4th, 2013 at 7:34 am
Hi. Thanks for the help. I am having trouble with multiple multirows in a table. It doesn’t seem to recognise that the second multirow exists. Any ideas?
April 4th, 2013 at 7:44 am
Hi Rachael,
Here is an example with multiple
multirowsin a table. If this doesn’t help solving your issue, please provide a minimal example.Thanks, Tom
\documentclass[11pt]{article} \usepackage{multirow} \begin{document} \begin{table}[ht] \caption{Multi-row table} \centering \begin{tabular}{ccc} \hline \multirow{2}{*}{Multirow}&X&\multirow{2}{*}{Multirow}\\ &X&\\ X&\multirow{2}{*}{Multirow}&\multirow{2}{*}{Multirow}\\ X&&\\ \hline \end{tabular} \label{tab:multirow} \end{table} \end{document}