Copy a table from excel to word, keeping the word table formatting

I have a word document with a table designed to be printed to make name cards - rows and columns are different sizes and the font size varies also. I want to copy various tables with students' names and numbers into the word table, preserving the word (target) formatting for cell size, font size etc. However whenever I paste a table from excel, it resets to the original font formatting and changes column widths etc. I have tried all the different types of paste, and also the "Paste from other programs" setting, but none of them allow me to keep the word table formatting and just change the text values. Using Office standard 2010.

2 Answers

Have you tried these two paste options: "Keep Source Formatting" and "Link & Keep Source Formatting"?

If pasting can't keep the table's formatting, you can try to embed the Excel workbook as object into the document. You can insert an Excel Spreedsheet in the document and then paste the table. See more:Insert an Excel Worksheet into a Word Doc

In order to get your intended result, you can copy and paste formatting from a duplicate of the table. (Use Ctrl+Shift+V to paste formatting only)

If you don't know what I mean, try these steps

1. Create a duplicate of the word document.
2. Copy and paste from excel to your intended word document. As you were suggesting, the formatting will be messed up.
3. Copy (Ctrl+C) the table with the correct formatting from the duplicate document.
4. Highlight over the table in the intended document. Press Ctrl+Shift+V to paste the formatting alone.

The result should be the new data with the original formatting.