How can I fit my table in the text block?

Question

I want to make my table fit in the text block. At the minute, a large part of my table is being cut off at the right-hand edge the page. My code is:

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{graphicx} % for \scalebox macro
\begin{document}
\begin{table}[h]
        \begin{center}
            \scalebox{0.8}{
            \begin{tabular}{|l|l|l|l|l}
                \cline{1-4}
                Risk Event                          & Chance of Happening & Severity      & Measures to be taken                                                                                                        &  \\ \cline{1-4}
                Team member missing meetings        & Significant         & Low           & Encourage team members to read over minutes and inform of any tasks set. If regularly absent issue a warning and then card. &  \\ \cline{1-4}
                QA/Project manager missing meetings & Significant         & Low/Moderate  & Deputy in role will act as manager.                                                                                         &  \\ \cline{1-4}
                Team member leaving project group   & Low                 & Moderate/High & List all tasks assigned to missing team member and reassign them, after this refactor the timetable and planning.           &  \\ \cline{1-4}
            \end{tabular}}
        \end{center}
    \end{table}
\end{document}

I have tried replacing \begin{center} with flushleft to no avail. How can I make the table fit in the page?

Answer 1

Your table has only four real columns; the fifth is always empty and should thus be omitted entirely. If you remove the fifth column, you can also replace all \cline{1-4} instructions with the simpler \hline.

The main problem with the table is, though, that it's much too wide for any normal page dimension unless you let the text in all four columns wrap. Hence, instead of the basic l column type, you should use a column type that lets the text wrap. I suggest you use the tabularx package and a (modified form of) that package's X column type. Set the width of the tabularx environment to \textwidth. Separately, because the columns are quite narrow, I suggest you typeset the material ragged-right rather than fully justified, in order to avoid very wide inter-word spaces.

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{tabularx,ragged2e}
\newcolumntype{Y}{>{\RaggedRight\arraybackslash}X}
\begin{document}
\begin{table}
\begin{tabularx}{\textwidth}{|*{4}{Y|}}
   \hline
   Risk Event & Chance of Happening & Severity      & Measures to be taken \\
   \hline
   Team member missing meetings & Significant  & Low    & Encourage team members to read over minutes and inform of any tasks set. If regularly absent issue a warning and then card. \\ \hline
   QA/Project manager missing meetings & Significant  & Low/Moderate  & Deputy in role will act as manager.\\ \hline
   Team member leaving project group   & Low    & Moderate/High & List all tasks assigned to missing team member and reassign them, after this refactor the timetable and planning.  \\
   \hline
\end{tabularx}
\end{table} 
\end{document}

Addendum: Just for the sake of comparison, here's the original look of your table, where I've made only one adjustment to your code: I've used \resizebox{\textwidth}{!}{...} instead of \scalebox{0.8}{...} to make the table fit inside the text block. I think we can agree that using resizebox along with l-type columns is not the way to go in this case.

Answer 2

You can do that with the tabularx package. To improve the tavle I also load cellspace , for a less tight vertical spacing of cell contents, and makecell for a common formatting of column heads and the possibility of line breaks in cells.

I didn't understand what the empty last column is here for, but if you don't use it, you might as well delete it. That would enable both to simplify the code and have the last vertical rule aligned with right margin.

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage[utf8]{inputenc}
\usepackage{lmodern}
\usepackage[showframe, nomarginpar]{geometry}
\usepackage{array, tabularx}
\renewcommand{\tabularxcolumn}[1]{>{\raggedright}m{#1}}
\newcolumntype{Y}{ >{\hsize =0.8\hsize}X}
\newcolumntype{Z}{ >{\hsize =1.2\hsize}X}
\usepackage{makecell}
\renewcommand\theadfont{\bfseries}
\renewcommand\theadalign{lc}
\renewcommand\cellalign{lc}
\usepackage{cellspace}
\setlength\cellspacetoplimit{5pt}
\setlength\cellspacebottomlimit{5pt}
\addparagraphcolumntypes{X, Y, Z}

\begin{document}

\begin{table}[!htbp]
        \begin{tabularx}{\linewidth}{|Y|l|l|S{Z}|l}
            \cline{1-4}
\thead{Risk Event} & \thead{Chance\\ of Happening} & \thead{Severity} & \thead{Measures\\ to be taken} & \\
\cline{1-4}
            Team member\break missing meetings & Significant & Low & Encourage team members to read over minutes and inform of any tasks set. If regularly absent issue a warning and then card. & \\
            \cline{1-4}
            QA/Project manager missing meetings & Significant & Low/Moderate & Deputy in role will act as manager. & \\
            \cline{1-4}
            Team member leaving project group & Low & Moderate/High & List all tasks assigned to missing team member and reassign them, after this refactor the timetable and planning. & \\
            \cline{1-4}
        \end{tabularx}%
\end{table}

\end{document} 

Answer 3

Use @{}:

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage[showframe]{geometry}
\begin{document}
\noindent\begin{tabular}{@{}*5{l}}
1 & 2 & 3 & 4 & 5\\
A & B & C & D & E\\
\end{tabular}
\end{document}

For future reference, please make your code compilable and minimal.

---

EDIT As John points out in his comment, you don't even need @{} if you have vertical lines in your table:

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage[showframe]{geometry}
\begin{document}
\noindent\begin{tabular}{*5{|l}}
1 & 2 & 3 & 4 & 5\\
A & B & C & D & E\\
\end{tabular}
\end{document}