Randomly select data in your Excel file

Use Select Randomly to get a random selection from a set of your Excel data range. It's also possible to specify the percentage and number of cells, rows, or columns you want to get from the entire selection.

How to randomly select values in a range

Pick the option to Select Randomly from the Randomize tool, Utilities group on the Ablebits Tools tab in Excel:
Click on the Select Randomly icon to run the tool.

The add-in offers you the following options:
Pick the options you need on the add-ins' pane.

  1. Your entire data range will be selected by default. Choose another range by highlighting it in Excel or entering it in this field.
  2. If you changed the range, highlight the entire table back by clicking the Expand selection icon.
  3. You can exclude header rows from the selection if there are any by checking My table has 1 header row.
    Tip. If there are more headers in your table, click on the "1 header row" phrase, enter the number of lines with labels, and they won't be selected:
    Let the add-in know how many header rows your table has.
  4. Expand the group with the option that suits you best:
    • You can select some number or percentage of random rows in your Excel table.
    • Pick random columns in your worksheet.
    • Or select some random cells in your range.
  5. Specify the number or percentage of rows, columns, or cells that you want to select. You can enter the necessary value into the percentage or number field respectively. Or set these values by clicking up and down arrows next to the fields.

Once options are chosen, click the Select button and get your datasets highlighted.