README

FastExcelWriter

FastExcelWriter is a part of the FastExcelPhp Project which consists of

• FastExcelWriter - to create Excel spreadsheets
• FastExcelReader - to reader Excel spreadsheets
• FastExcelTemplator - to generate Excel spreadsheets from XLSX templates
• FastExcelLaravel - special Laravel edition

Introduction

This library is designed to be lightweight, super-fast and requires minimal memory usage.

FastExcelWriter creates Excel compatible spreadsheets in XLSX format (Office 2007+), with many features supported:

• Takes UTF-8 encoded input
• Multiple worksheets
• Supports currency/date/numeric cell formatting, formulas and active hyperlinks
• Supports most styling options for cells, rows, columns - colors, borders, fonts, etc.
• You can set the height of the rows and the width of the columns (including auto width calculation)
• You can add formulas, notes and images in you XLSX-files
• Supports workbook and sheet protection with/without passwords
• Supports page settings - page margins, page size

Jump To:

• Changes in version 4
• Simple Example
• Advanced Example
• Row's settings
• Column's settings
• Define Named Ranges
• Adding Notes
• Adding Images
• Workbook
  • Workbook settings
  • Sets metadata of workbook
  • Set Directory For Temporary Files
  • Helpers methods
• Sheets
  • Create, select and remove sheet
  • Sheet settings
  • Page settings
  • Freeze Panes and Autofilter
  • Setting Active Cells
• Writing
  • Writing Row by Row vs Direct
  • Direct Writing To Cells
  • Writing Cell Values
  • Merging Cells
  • Cell Formats
  • Formulas
  • Hyperlinks
• Styles
  • Cell Styles
  • Row Styles
  • Column Styles
  • Other Columns Options
  • Apply Styles (The Fluent Interface)
  • Apply Borders
  • Apply Fonts
  • Apply Colors
  • Apply Text Styles
• Protection of workbook and sheets
  • Workbook protection
  • Sheet protection
  • Cells locking/unlocking
• FastExcelWriter vs PhpSpreadsheet
• Do you want to support FastExcelWriter?

Installation

Use composer to install FastExcelWriter into your project:

composer require Sivolobov/fast-excel-writer

Changes In Version 4

• Now the library works even faster
• Added a fluent interface for applying styles.
• New methods and code refactoring

Usage

You can find usage examples below or in /demo folder

Simple Example

use \avadim\FastExcelWriter\Excel;

$data = [
    ['2003-12-31', 'James', '220'],
    ['2003-8-23', 'Mike', '153.5'],
    ['2003-06-01', 'John', '34.12'],
];

$excel = Excel::create(['Sheet1']);
$sheet = $excel->sheet();

// Write heads
$sheet->writeRow(['Date', 'Name', 'Amount']);

// Write data
foreach($data as $rowData) {
    $rowOptions = [
        'height' => 20,
    ];
    $sheet->writeRow($rowData, $rowOptions);
}

$excel->save('simple.xlsx');

Also, you can download generated file to client (send to browser)

$excel->download('download.xlsx');

Advanced Example

use \avadim\FastExcelWriter\Excel;

$head = ['Date', 'Name', 'Amount'];
$data = [
    ['2003-12-31', 'James', '220'],
    ['2003-8-23', 'Mike', '153.5'],
    ['2003-06-01', 'John', '34.12'],
];
$headStyle = [
    'font' => [
        'style' => 'bold'
    ],
    'text-align' => 'center',
    'vertical-align' => 'center',
    'border' => 'thin',
    'height' => 24,
];

$excel = Excel::create(['Sheet1']);
$sheet = $excel->sheet();

// Write the head row (sets style via array)
$sheet->writeHeader($head, $headStyle);

// The same result with new fluent interface
$sheet->writeHeader($head)
    ->applyFontStyleBold()
    ->applyTextAlign('center', 'center')
    ->applyBorder(Style::BORDER_STYLE_THIN)
    ->applyRowHeight(24);

// Sets columns options - format and width (the first way)
$sheet
    ->setColFormats(['@date', '@text', '0.00'])
    ->setColWidths([12, 14, 5]);

// The seconds way to set columns options
$sheet
    // column and options
    ->setColOptions('A', ['format' => '@date', 'width' => 12])
    // column letter in lower case
    ->setColOptions('b', ['format' => '@text', 'width' => 24])
    // column can be specified by number
    ->setColOptions(3, ['format' => '0.00', 'width' => 15, 'color' => '#090'])
;

// The third way - all options in multilevel array (first level keys point to columns)
$sheet
    ->setColOptions([
        'A' => ['format' => '@date', 'width' => 12],
        'B' => ['format' => '@text', 'width' => 24],
        'C' => ['format' => '0.00', 'width' => 15, 'color' => '#090'],
    ]);

$rowNum = 1;
foreach($data as $rowData) {
    $rowOptions = [
        'height' => 20,
    ];
    if ($rowNum % 2) {
        $rowOptions['fill-color'] = '#eee';
    }
    $sheet->writeRow($rowData, $rowOptions);
}

$excel->save('simple.xlsx');

Row's settings

You can set row options (styles and height) by the second argument when you use the function writeRow(). Note that in this case these styles will only be applied to those cells in the row where data is written

// Write row data and set height
$rowOptions = [
    'fill-color' => '#fffeee',
    'border' => 'thin',
    'height' => 28,
];
$sheet->writeRow(['aaa', 'bbb', 'ccc'], $rowOptions);

Other way with the same result

$sheet->writeRow(['aaa', 'bbb', 'ccc', null, 'eee'])
    ->applyFillColor('#fffeee')
    ->applyBorder('thin')
    ->applyRowHeight(28);

You can set row's height or visibility

// Set height of row 2 to 33
$sheet->setRowHeight(2, 33);

// Set height of rows 3,5 and 7 to 33
$sheet->setRowHeight([3, 5, 7], 33);

// Set heights of several rows
$sheet->setRowHeights([1 => 20, 2 => 33, 3 => 40]);

// Hide row 8
$sheet->setRowVisible(8, false);

// Other way
$sheet->setRowHidden(8);

// Hide rows 9, 10, 11
$sheet->setRowVisible([9, 10, 11], false);

// Show row 10
$sheet->setRowVisible(10, true);

IMPORTANT: You can only use the setRowXX() functions on rows numbered at least as high as the current one. See Writing Row by Row vs Direct Therefore, the following code will throw an error "Row number must be greater then written rows"

$sheet = $excel->sheet();
// Write row 1
$sheet->writeRow(['aaa1', 'bbb1', 'ccc1']);
// Write row 2
$sheet->writeRow(['aaa2', 'bbb2', 'ccc2']);
// Try to set height of previous row 1
$sheet->setRowHeight(1, 33);

Column's settings

Column widths can be set in several ways

// Set width of column D to 24
$this->setColWidth('D', 24);
$this->setColOptions('D', ['width' => 24]);
// Set auto width
$this->setColWidth('D', 'auto');
$this->setColWidthAuto('D');
$this->setColOptions('D', ['width' => 'auto']);

// Set width of specific columns
$sheet->setColWidths(['B' => 10, 'C' => 'auto', 'E' => 30, 'F' => 40]);
// Set width of columns from 'A'
$sheet->setColWidths([10, 20, 30, 40], 24);

$colOptions = [
    'B' => ['width' => 10], 
    'C' => ['width' => 'auto'], 
    'E' => ['width' => 30], 
    'F' => ['width' => 40],
];
$sheet->setColOptions($colOptions);

You can define a minimal width of columns. Note that the minimum value has higher priority

// Set minimum width to 20 
$this->setColMinWidth('D', 20);
// The value 10 will not be set because it is less than the minimum value
$this->setColWidth('D', 10);
// But width 30 will be set
$this->setColWidth('D', 30);
// The column width will be set to the width of the content, but not less than 20
$this->setColWidthAuto('D');

Define Named Ranges

FastExcelWriter supports named ranges and does not support named formulae. A named ranges provides a name reference to a cell or a range of cells. All named ranges are added to the workbook so all names must be unique, but you can define named ranges in a sheet or in a workbook.

Also range names must start with a letter or underscore, have no spaces, and be no longer than 255 characters.

$excel = Excel::create();
$excel->setFileName($outFileName);
$sheet = $excel->sheet();

// Named a single cell
$sheet->addNamedRange('B2', 'cell_name');

// Named range in a sheet
$sheet->addNamedRange('c2:e3', 'range_name');

// Add named range in a workbook (sheet name required)
$excel->addNamedRange('Sheet1!A1:F5', 'A1_F5');

// You can define name using applyNamedRange()
$sheet->writeCell(1000)->applyNamedRange('Value');
$sheet->writeCell(0.12)->applyNamedRange('Rate');
// Add the formula using names
$sheet->writeCell('=Value*Rate');

Adding Notes

There are currently two types of comments in Excel - comments and notes (see The difference between threaded comments and notes). Notes are old style comments in Excel (text on a light yellow background). You can add notes to any cells using method addNote()

$sheet->writeCell('Text to A1');
$sheet->addNote('A1', 'This is a note for cell A1');

$sheet->writeCell('Text to B1')->addNote('This is a note for B1');
$sheet->writeTo('C4', 'Text to C4')->addNote('Note for C1');

// If you specify a range of cells, then the note will be added to the left top cell
$sheet->addNote('E4:F8', "This note\nwill added to E4");

// You can split text into multiple lines
$sheet->addNote('D7', "Line 1\nLine 2");

You can change some note options. Allowed options of a note are:

• width - default value is '96pt'
• height - default value is '55.5pt'
• fill_color - default value is '#FFFFE1'
• show - default value is false

$sheet->addNote('A1', 'This is a note for cell A1', ['width' => '200pt', 'height' => '100pt', 'fill_color' => '#ffcccc']);

// Parameters "width" and "height" can be numeric, by default these values are in points
// The "fill_color" parameter can be shortened
$noteStyle = [
    'width' => 200, // equivalent to '200pt'
    'height' => 100, // equivalent to '100pt'
    'fill_color' => 'fcc', // equivalent to '#ffcccc'
];
$sheet->writeCell('Text to B1')->addNote('This is a note for B1', $noteStyle);

// This note is visible when the Excel workbook is displayed
$sheet->addNote('C8', 'This note is always visible', ['show' => true]);

Adding Images

// Insert an image to the cell A1
$sheet->addImage('A1', 'path/to/file');

// Insert an image to the cell B2 and set with to 150 pixels (height will change proportionally)
$sheet->addImage('B2', 'path/to/file', ['width' => 150]);

// Set height to 150 pixels (with will change proportionally)
$sheet->addImage('C3', 'path/to/file', ['height' => 150]);

// Set size in pixels
$sheet->addImage('D4', 'path/to/file', ['width' => 150, 'height' => 150]);

FastExcelWriter vs PhpSpreadsheet

PhpSpreadsheet is a perfect library with wonderful features for reading and writing many document formats. FastExcelWriter can only write and only in XLSX format, but does it very fast and with minimal memory usage.

FastExcelWriter:

• 7-9 times faster
• uses less memory by 8-10 times
• supports writing huge 100K+ row spreadsheets

Benchmark of PhpSpreadsheet (P) and FastExcelWriter (F), spreadsheet generation without styles

Do you want to support FastExcelWriter?

if you find this package useful you can support and donate to me for a cup of coffee:

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Or just give me a star on GitHub :)