How to Put an Excel Table in Illustrator
By Joshua Mcgee
Updated September 28, 2017
Items you will need
Microsoft Excel
Adobe Illustrator
Adobe print driver
While Microsoft Excel is a useful program for adding data to tables, it is not very convenient for designing the tables for presentations. Adobe Illustrator, on the other hand, is useful for professionally designed presentation, but it does not contain a table feature that lets you add data easily. Therefore, you cannot simply import a table from Excel into Illustrator. You can, however, import PDF files that are completely editable and as long as you have an Adobe print driver installed, you can print Excel files as a PDF file.
Open the table in Excel.
Click on the “File” and select “Print.” Click on the printer “Drop-down” menu; select “Adobe PDF.” Then press “OK” to print the Excel worksheet as a PDF.
Open Adobe Illustrator.
Click on the “File” menu and select “Open.” Navigate to the PDF that you just created. Press “Open;” the table will open in Illustrator allowing you to manipulate each feature of the table.
Tips
Some of the text may have separated into separate paths. Use the “JoinTextFrame” script or the “MergeText_AI” script to recombine the text and make editing easier.
Writer Bio
Josh McGee graduated from Utah State University with a bachelor's degree in English, professional and technical communication, and a minor in marketing. He has worked as a technical writer and illustrator for two large manufacturing companies, ICON Health and Fitness and Cover-Pools Incorporated. He is currently employed full-time for the latter.