How to mail merge labels from Excel
Word’s mail merge on Windows and Mac, a fix for each way it goes wrong, and what to do in Google Docs. Or skip the merge and print the same list from your browser.
- In a blank Word document, choose Mailings › Start Mail Merge › Labels, then Avery US Letter and your product number.
- Select Recipients › Use an Existing List, open the Excel file, and keep “First row of data contains column headers” ticked.
- In the first label only, add each column with Insert Merge Field, typing the spaces and commas yourself.
- Click Update Labels, then Preview Results.
- Finish & Merge › Edit Individual Documents, and print the result at 100% scale.
Set up the spreadsheet first
Word reads the workbook as a table, so give it one: one row per label, one column per piece of information, and plain column names in the first row.
Headers, blank rows, and where the file lives
The column names become your merge fields. “Name”, “Address”, “City”, “State” and “ZIP” are easier to pick from Word’s field list than F1, F2 and F3, which is what Word calls columns it has no names for. Keep each part of an address in its own column; an address typed into one cell with line breaks inside it arrives as one run of text, and you lose control of where the lines fall. The address labels guide covers the line order the Postal Service expects.
Remove blank rows, merged cells and any title row sitting above the column names before you attach the file. Format the ZIP code column as Text before the codes go in: Microsoft’s own data source checklist warns that leading zeros are dropped during a merge if they are not formatted as text.
Save the workbook where it will stay. The Word document keeps a path to it, so moving or renaming the file later breaks the connection.
How do I mail merge labels from Excel in Word?
Start in Word, not Excel. Turn a blank document into a sheet of labels, attach the workbook, build the first label, and let Update Labels copy it to the rest. These are the steps on Windows; Word for Mac uses the same Mailings ribbon, and its differences follow.
- Open a blank document. On the Mailings tab, choose Start Mail Merge, then Labels.
- In Label Options, set Label vendors to Avery US Letter and pick the product number printed on your label package, for example 5160 Address Labels. If nothing matches, New Label lets you enter the sheet’s measurements; every sheet in the template index lists them. Click OK. Word turns the page into a table whose cells match the labels; if you cannot see the cell edges, turn on View Gridlines on the table’s Layout tab.
- Choose Select Recipients, then Use an Existing List, and open your .xlsx file. In the Select Table box, pick the worksheet and leave First row of data contains column headers ticked. Edit Recipient List lets you sort the list or untick people you want to leave out.
- Click into the first label only, the top-left cell. Use Insert Merge Field to place each column, typing the spaces, commas and line breaks yourself: Word inserts the field and nothing around it, so «City», «State» «ZIP» needs the comma and spaces typed in. Address Block inserts a whole address in one go instead; check its preview shows your columns in the right places.
- Format that first label the way every label should look: font, size, and alignment. To center the text both ways, select the table and use the center alignment button on the table’s Layout tab.
- Click Update Labels. It copies the first label into every other label, each starting with a «Next Record» field, which is what moves Word down the list instead of repeating the first row. Click it again after any later change to the first label.
- Click Preview Results to see real names and addresses in place of the fields. Page through with the arrows and look at the longest addresses; a line that wraps on screen will wrap on the label.
- Choose Finish & Merge, then Edit Individual Documents, and merge All. Word makes a new document holding every page of labels. Print one page on plain paper, hold it against a label sheet, then print the rest at 100% scale with “Fit to page” off.
- Save the original merge document if you will print from this list again. Next time, open it, check the recipients, and go straight to Finish & Merge.
Following Microsoft’s Step-by-Step wizard instead
Microsoft’s own Windows instructions, Print labels for your mailing list, use the Step-by-Step Mail Merge Wizard (Mailings › Start Mail Merge › Step-by-Step Mail Merge Wizard) instead of the ribbon. It is the same merge in a task pane, in seven steps: choose Labels, Label Options, Browse for the list, Address block, Update all labels, preview, and complete the merge. Use whichever you prefer. The ribbon route above is the one that also exists on a Mac.
How is it different in Word for Mac?
Word for Mac uses the same Mailings ribbon route, but it has no Step-by-Step Mail Merge Wizard and no DDE option for keeping Excel’s number formatting.
Microsoft’s Mac steps, file access and ZIP codes
Microsoft’s Mac instructions run to thirteen steps: Mailings › Start Mail Merge › Labels, choose the label products and product number, save the document, Select Recipients, Insert Merge Field, format the first label, Update Labels, Preview Results, then Finish & Merge. The list of vendors is called Label products, and Microsoft has you save the document before you attach the list rather than at the end. If the label outlines are missing, Table Layout › View Gridlines shows them.
Microsoft’s Windows article is written around the wizard, so Mac users following a Windows tutorial go looking for a pane that is not there, as in this Microsoft Q&A thread. You do not need it: Microsoft’s Mac instructions use the ribbon, as the numbered steps above do.
Two things are specific to the Mac. Word runs inside the macOS sandbox, so it can ask you to Grant File Access to the workbook, sometimes more than once. And with no DDE, formatting the ZIP column as Text in Excel is the only way to keep leading zeros in a Word merge. The labels on a Mac guide covers Excel for Mac, Numbers and Pages.
Can I mail merge labels in Microsoft 365 or Word for the web?
Yes in desktop Word, using the steps above, if your Microsoft 365 plan includes it. No in Word for the web.
Which plans include desktop Word
Microsoft says Word for the web does not support creating labels directly, only starting from a label template. It also cannot perform a mail merge or edit merge settings. So the question is whether your plan includes the desktop app.
Microsoft 365 Personal and Family, Business Standard and Business Premium include desktop Word. Business Basic has the web and mobile apps only, so it cannot run a label merge, and neither can a Chromebook or a tablet. On those, a tool that reads the spreadsheet in the browser, such as the one further down this page, does the same job.
How do I fix mail merge label problems?
Find what you are seeing in the list below; each has its cause and fix. The first three are related, so if one fix does not work, read the next.
- Only the first label is filled in
- Every label on a page shows the same person
- Only one label per page
- Blank lines where a field is empty
- Text will not center vertically
- ZIP codes lost their leading zero
- Fields called F1, F2, F3
- Word asks to run an SQL command
- Labels print off the cuts
Only the first label is filled in; the rest are blank
Click Update Labels on the Mailings tab. Until you do, the other labels hold no merge fields, so the merge fills the top-left label and leaves the rest of the sheet empty. It is the standard answer on Microsoft Q&A for exactly this symptom. Click it again whenever you change the first label, then check the result with Preview Results or by merging to Edit Individual Documents.
Every label on a page shows the same person (Next Record not working)
Every label after the first has to begin with a «Next Record» field; without it, Word prints a whole page of one person before moving on. Click Update Labels, then check that the field is there.
How to check the Next Record fields
On Windows, press Alt+F9 to show field codes.
«Next Record» appears as { NEXT } at the start of
each label after the first. If one is missing, put the cursor at
the start of that label and choose Mailings › Rules › Next Record,
then press Alt+F9 again to hide the codes.
(Microsoft Q&A)
If every label shows the same typed text rather than different people, the first label held plain text instead of merge fields when you clicked Update Labels, and Word copied that text everywhere. Delete it, insert the fields with Insert Merge Field, and update again. (Microsoft Q&A)
Only one label per page
Finish the merge with Finish & Merge › Edit Individual Documents before you judge it. While you are only previewing, Word shows one record at a time, and the pages can look like one label each; the merged document shows the real page count.
If the merged document still has one label per page
A Microsoft volunteer gives the preview explanation in this Q&A thread. If the finished document really does put one person on each page, check the product number in Label Options against the package. In another thread the cause was Avery 8165, a single full-page label, picked instead of the 30-per-sheet 8160. Word lays out exactly the sheet you name.
A missing Update Labels can also look like this, with each page carrying one label and the rest blank; see only the first label is filled in.
Blank lines where a field is empty
Put the optional field inside an IF field, so its line break prints only when the field has something in it. This is the pattern a Microsoft MVP gives in this Q&A answer, for a second address line that is often empty:
{ MERGEFIELD Name }
{ MERGEFIELD Address1 }{ IF "{ MERGEFIELD Address2 }" <> "" "
{ MERGEFIELD Address2 }" }
{ MERGEFIELD City }, { MERGEFIELD State } { MERGEFIELD ZIP }
Typing the IF field, and a way to avoid it
The line break before the second «Address2» sits inside the IF field’s quotes, so when Address2 is empty nothing is inserted at all. The braces have to be real field braces, inserted with Ctrl+F9 on Windows or Cmd+F9 on a Mac; braces typed from the keyboard are just text. Build it in the first label, then Update Labels.
Print Labels From Excel handles this without a field code: a label line whose columns are all empty for a row is left out, and the lines below close up.
Text will not center vertically on the label
Select the whole label table and use the button on the table’s Layout tab that centers text both across and down. If the text still sits at the top, something below it is taking up room: paragraph spacing after the last line, an extra empty paragraph under the fields, or a large bottom cell margin.
Finding what is pushing the text up
Those three causes are the ones listed in this Microsoft Q&A thread. Turn on Show/Hide (the ¶ button on the Home tab) to see empty paragraphs, and set Spacing After to 0 in the Paragraph settings. Whatever formatting the first label carries, Update Labels copies to every label, so a stray indent or inherited spacing multiplies across the sheet at once. Fix the first label, then update again.
If an Address Block leaves extra space between its lines, tick “Don’t add space between paragraphs of the same style” in the Paragraph settings; a user in the blank-fields thread reports that it fixed the spacing.
ZIP codes lost their leading zero, or prices lost their dollar sign
Word reads the value Excel stores, not what the cell displays, so 02134 can merge as 2134, $12.50 as 12.5 and 50% as .5. Microsoft documents this behavior. The fix that works everywhere is to format the ZIP column as Text in Excel and enter the codes again.
The Windows-only DDE fix, and why re-entering matters
Changing the format after the zeros are gone does not bring them back, because the cell already holds the number 2134. Select the column, choose Format Cells › Number › Text, re-enter or paste the codes, save the workbook, and attach it again.
On Windows, Microsoft also describes a way to merge with Excel’s formatting intact. In Word, go to File › Options › Advanced and tick Confirm file format conversion on open. Then, when you browse to the workbook, tick Show all in the Confirm Data Source box, choose MS Excel Worksheets via DDE (*.xls), and pick the sheet or range. Without Show all, the DDE option is not listed. DDE does not exist in Word for Mac.
Print Labels From Excel prints what Excel displays, so a ZIP formatted 00000 prints as 02134 and $12.50 stays $12.50. In a column named ZIP it also pads three- and four-digit values back to five digits (in a postal code column, only on rows with a US state) and says how many it changed.
The merge fields are called F1, F2, F3
Word did not read your first row as column names. Choose Select Recipients › Use an Existing List again and, in the Select Table box, tick First row of data contains column headers. Make sure the names really are in row 1, with no title row above them. The opposite mistake shows up as fields named after your first recipient, which means row 1 holds data rather than names. (Microsoft Q&A)
Word asks to run an SQL command when I open the document
That prompt is Word checking before it reconnects a merge document to its data source, and Microsoft describes it as behavior by design. Choose Yes to open the document with your spreadsheet attached; No opens it without the list. If Word then says it cannot find the workbook, the file has probably been moved or renamed since the last merge: use Select Recipients to point to it again.
Labels print off the cuts
Print at actual size: Scale 100% on a Mac, Actual size on Windows, with “Fit to page” off. Then check that Label Options names the same product and vendor as your package; Avery’s US Letter and A4 ranges number their sheets differently. If a plain-paper test still does not line up, labels not lining up walks through each cause.
Can you mail merge labels in Google Docs?
Not with Google Docs alone. Docs has no label feature of its own, so a label merge from Google Sheets needs an add-on, Avery’s website, or a tool that reads the sheet directly.
Add-ons, Avery’s route, and the access they ask for
Add-ons come from Extensions › Add-ons › Get add-ons. Google’s add-on help page says most of them ask, when you install them, for access to the data they need, and that some may not work without third-party cookies. The label add-ons in the Workspace Marketplace, checked in September 2026, ask for anything from access to the current document to permission to see, edit, create and delete all of your Google Docs, or all of your Google Drive files. Several limit how many labels a free account can merge. Add-ons do not run in the Docs app on iPhone or iPad.
Avery’s own Avery Label Merge add-on is no longer in the Google Workspace store. Avery points people to its free Design & Print Online, which connects to Google Sheets and needs an Avery account, and it states that Marketplace apps named “Avery Label Merge”, “Foxy Labels” and “Label Maker” are third-party apps not affiliated with Avery.
The other route needs no add-on at all. Select the cells in Google Sheets, copy them, and paste them into Print Labels From Excel below: the rows are read in your browser tab and nothing asks for access to your Google account. Labels from Google Sheets covers it step by step.
How do I print labels from Excel without a mail merge?
Give the spreadsheet to a tool that lays out the sheet itself. Print Labels From Excel reads the file in your browser, builds each label from your column names, and downloads a PDF for your Avery sheet, with no document in between.
What replaces the merge fields, and when to keep Word
Mail merge is a means, not the goal. It takes one layout and repeats it once per row of a data source, substituting values as it goes. For letters that is genuinely useful, because the layout is a page of prose with a few variable pieces. For labels the layout is a small box containing nothing but variable pieces, which is a much smaller problem wearing a much larger machine. Microsoft’s own instructions run to seven steps on Windows and thirteen on a Mac, to express one idea: put this column on that line.
Typing {City} into a label line is the same idea as inserting a merge field, minus the document. Add the workbook or paste the cells, and a US address list is laid out for you: name, street, and {City}, {State} {ZIP} on the last line. Change any line, pick a sheet such as Avery 5160, and download the PDF. Changing the list later means adding the new file and downloading again. There is no saved connection to break, because there is no document to save; a layout made only of column names and punctuation is remembered on your device for the next list with the same columns.
None of this is a criticism of Word, which is doing a general-purpose job. It is an argument that labels do not need one. If you already have a working Word merge and it suits you, keep it. This is for people whose merge broke, who are on a Mac following a tutorial written for a wizard they do not have, who have no desktop Word at all, or who only need labels twice a year and would rather not relearn the steps each time.
| Problem | In a Word merge | In Print Labels From Excel |
|---|---|---|
| Filling the rest of the sheet | Update Labels copies the first label, and «Next Record» moves to the next row. | Every row with something to print is a label. There is nothing to copy or update. |
| City, State ZIP | Three merge fields, with the comma and spaces typed between them. | One line, {City}, {State} {ZIP}, set up automatically for US address columns. |
| An empty field | Leaves a blank line unless it is wrapped in an IF field. | A line whose columns are all empty for that row is left out. |
| ZIP codes and prices | Reads the stored value, so 02134 can print as 2134 and $12.50 as 12.5. | Prints what Excel displays, and pads 3–4 digit US ZIP codes back to five digits. |
| Next time | Reopen the document, answer the SQL prompt, and find the workbook if it moved. | Add the new file. Nothing is linked, and nothing is uploaded. |
Make the labels without a merge
Add the same Excel file you would have merged, or paste the cells. It is read in this browser tab and never uploaded.
Add your list
Read inside this browser tab. Your file is never uploaded.
The labels update as soon as you paste. Tip: Ctrl+V (⌘+V on a Mac) anywhere on this page works too.
Show the first rows
Swipe the table sideways to see every column.
Arrange the label
Each line here is a line on the label. Click a column name to insert it, or type any text you want printed. A line whose columns are all empty for a row is left out, so the rest close up.
More options
Drawn as vector shapes, never as an image, so edges stay sharp at any print size.
Pick a column that holds a number to print each row that many times.
Size and alignment per line
Choose the label sheet or roll
Printing on a partly used sheet?
Or pick the first unused label on the sheet below. Earlier positions are left blank.
Labels printing a little off?
First print the blank template on plain paper at actual size and check the usual causes. If every label is off by the same amount, move them back here. A minus sign moves left or up. Saved in this browser for this sheet.
Preview
Sample list
Sheet 1 of 1
First label, enlarged
Download and print
The layout has no columns in it, so every label is the same. The starting number fills the rest of one sheet.
In the print dialog choose Actual size (100%). “Fit to page” shrinks the sheet and pushes every label off its cut. The PDF asks your viewer for actual size, but check before you print a full run.
Mail merge label questions
Why does only the first label print in my mail merge?
Update Labels was not clicked, or was clicked before the first label was finished. It copies the first label’s merge fields into every other label on the sheet, each of which starts with a Next Record field. Click it again after any change to the first label, then check with Preview Results.
What does Next Record do in a Word label merge?
Next Record tells Word to move to the next row of the spreadsheet without starting a new page. After Update Labels, every label after the first should start with one. If they are missing, a whole page repeats the same person. On Windows, Alt+F9 shows field codes, where Next Record appears as { NEXT }.
Can you mail merge labels in Word for the web?
No. Microsoft says Word for the web cannot perform a mail merge or edit mail merge settings, and cannot create labels directly. A label merge needs desktop Word on Windows or Mac. Print Labels From Excel is an alternative that runs in any browser and reads the spreadsheet itself.
Is there a mail merge for labels in Google Docs?
Not built in. Google Docs has no label feature, so a label merge from Google Sheets runs through a Marketplace add-on, which asks for access to your Google data when you install it, or through Avery Design & Print Online. Print Labels From Excel takes cells copied from Google Sheets instead, with nothing to install or authorize; see labels from Google Sheets.
How do I print mail merge labels without Word?
Print Labels From Excel reads an Excel, CSV or pasted spreadsheet in your browser, builds each label from column names in braces such as {City}, {State} {ZIP}, and downloads a PDF laid out for your Avery sheet. There is no document, no Update Labels and no Next Record, and the file is never uploaded.