XLMAC: Macro to Delete Every Other Row

This article contains a sample Microsoft Visual Basic for Applications macro (Sub procedure) that you can use to delete every other row of a selection on a Microsoft Excel worksheet.

Microsoft provides programming examples for illustration only, without warranty either expressed or implied. This includes, but is not limited to, the implied warranties of merchantability or fitness for a particular purpose. This article assumes that you are familiar with the programming language that is being demonstrated and with the tools that are used to create and to debug procedures. Microsoft support engineers can help explain the functionality of a particular procedure, but they will not modify these examples to provide added functionality or construct procedures to meet your specific requirements. To use the following macro, you will need to set up a Microsoft Excel file as follows:

1. Create a new Microsoft Excel workbook.
2. In a new worksheet, in the range A1:A9, type the numbers 1 to 5, skipping rows, as in the following example:
   A1: 1
   A2:
   A3: 2
   A4:
   A5: 3
   A6:
   A7: 4
   A8:
   A9: 5
3. On the Tools menu, point to Macro, and then click Visual Basic Editor. On the Insert menu, click Module.
4. In the new module, type the following macro:

         Sub Delete_Every_Other_Row()
   
             ' Dimension variables.
             Y = False              ' Change this to True if you want to
                                    ' delete rows 1, 3, 5, and so on.
             I = 1
             Set xRng = Selection
   
             ' Loop once for every row in the selection.
             For xCounter = 1 To xRng.Rows.Count
   
                 ' If Y is True, then...
                 If Y = True Then
   
                     ' ...delete an entire row of cells.
                     xRng.Cells(I).EntireRow.Delete
   
                 ' Otherwise...
                 Else
   
                     ' ...increment I by one so we can cycle through range.
                     I = I + 1
   
                 End If
   
                 ' If Y is True, make it False; if Y is False, make it True.
                 Y = Not Y
   
              Next xCounter
   
          End Sub
   						

5. Switch to the worksheet that contains the data, and select the range A1:A9.
6. On the Tools menu, point to Macro, and then click Macros. Click Delete_Every_Other_Row, and then click Run.

This macro will delete every other row, starting with the second row of the selection.

NOTE: When you have a list of data that contains multiple columns, select only the first column of data, and then run the macro.