It’s very frustrating when you try to unhide some Excel rows or columns that appear to be hidden, but they nevertheless remain hidden. This can be caused by several situations:
- Protection is turned on so changes to the worksheet’s rows or columns are not permitted.
- The top rows (or leftmost columns) are hidden so selecting one of them seems impossible.
- Active filters are forcibly hiding rows that don’t meet the filter criteria. (This impacts rows, but not columns.)
- The panes are “frozen” so that when scrolling down many rows, the top rows (esp. the column headings) stay on the screen or, similarly, when scrolling far to the left, important right-hand columns stay on the screen. When panes are frozen, additional rows above the freeze point will remain hidden, as well as additional far-left columns.
- Very narrow rows or columns (< 0.6 unit) seem hidden even when visible. (See https://wmfexcel.com/2014/04/01/when-unhide-row-doesnt-work/)
For corrective actions, see https://www.wps.com/blog/how-to-fix-unhide-rows-in-excel-not-working-easy-guide/