Align first row of a table differently then subsequent rows

Question

For example, is it possible to justify the first row of a table differently from the rest? Maybe there is a way to combine two tables to look like one? MWE:

\documentclass{article}
\begin{document}

\begin{table}
  \begin{tabular}{| c | c | c | c |}
    \hline
    & \textbf{S1} & \textbf{S2} & \textbf{S3} \\
    \hline
    \textbf{D1} & 4217 & 5821 & 1102 \\
    \textbf{D2} & 3679 & 5089 & 991 \\
    \textbf{D3} & 2589 & 3301 & 604 \\
    \textbf{D4} & 1418 & 1722 & 294 \\
    \hline
  \end{tabular}
\end{table}

\end{document}

Welcome to TeX.SE! The short answer to both of your questions is: "Yes." Please consider adding a minimum working example (MWE) of the tabular environment you have in mind. Without such information, it's going to be very difficult to provide more specific suggestions. — Mico, Feb 22 '12 at 03:16

score 11 · Accepted Answer · edited Jun 09 '17 at 07:32

The standard way to justify the heading rows of a small table is to use the \multicolumn command, which allows you to override the column specification for each span of rows. In this example, I've used the booktabs package, which is highly recommended for any professional looking table.

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{booktabs}
\begin{document}
\begin{tabular}{lrp{1in}}
\toprule
\multicolumn{1}{c}{A} & \multicolumn{1}{c}{B} & \multicolumn{1}{c}{C}\\
\midrule
left & right & 1 inch\\
l & r & foo\\
\bottomrule
\end{tabular}
\end{document}

output of code

For some fancier ideas for heading rows, see Make first row of table all bold.

Would that be a ISO standard, or IEEE standard, or...? ;-) — morbusg, Feb 22 '12 at 06:59

score 5 · Answer 2 · edited Jun 11 '17 at 09:26

This is a slightly different approach to what is posted in Make first row of table all bold.

tabular environments are easily formatted column-wise. Not so much row-wise. However, there are ways around it. Here's one attempt.

You can use an \if... conditional to distinguish between your header/non-header rows. \newif\headerrow defines the condition \ifheaderrow that can be either true (\headerrowtrue) or false (\headerrowfalse). Subsequently you can insert contents before each table entry depending on this condition with the aid of the array package:

enter image description here

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{array}% http://ctan.org/pkg/array
\newif\ifheaderrow
\newcolumntype{C}{>{\ifheaderrow\bfseries\fi}c}
\begin{document}
\begin{table}
  \global\headerrowtrue
  \begin{tabular}{|>{\bfseries}c | *{3}{C|}}
    \hline
    & S1 & S2 & S3 \\ 
    \hline \global\headerrowfalse
     D1 & 4217 & 5821 & 1102 \\
    D2 & 3679 & 5089 & 991 \\
    D3 & 2589 & 3301 & 604 \\
    D4 & 1418 & 1722 & 294 \\
    \hline
  \end{tabular}
\end{table}

\end{document}

The resetting of \headerrowfalse must be made \global, since the modification would otherwise only hold within the group, which is the cell within which it is called.

I like it, but is it just me or does this seem hackish (like a lot of LaTeX I see)? Maybe it's just me being new to LaTeX. — Jeff, Feb 23 '12 at 00:20
@Jeff: Perhaps, but "hackish" may be a very subjective term. There's also the tabu package which make the above perhaps look a little less "hackish." — Werner, Feb 23 '12 at 00:27

score 0 · Answer 3 · answered Aug 13 '23 at 11:16

after eleven years ...

by use of the makecell package:

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{booktabs,
            makecell} % for `thead` command
\renewcommand\theadfont{}
\begin{document}
\begin{tabular}{lrp{1in}}
\toprule
\thead{A} & \thead{B} & \thead{C}\\
\midrule
left & right & 1 inch\\
l & r & foo\\
\bottomrule
\end{tabular}
\end{document}

or

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{booktabs,
            makecell}
\renewcommand\theadfont{\normalsize\bfseries}
\begin{document}
\begin{tabular}{lrp{1in}}
\toprule
\thead{A} & \thead{B} & \thead{C}\\
\midrule
left & right & 1 inch\\
l & r & foo\\
\bottomrule
\end{tabular}
\end{document}

today someone my consider novel table package tabularray:

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{tabularray}
\UseTblrLibrary{booktabs}
\begin{document}
\begin{tblr}{colspec = {l r Q[l, wd=1in]},
             row{1} = {c, font=\bfseries}
             }
    \toprule
A       & B     & C         \
    \midrule
left    & right & 1 inch    \
l       & r     & foo       \
    \bottomrule
\end{tblr}
\end{document}

result is the same as in the second example.

Align first row of a table differently then subsequent rows

3 Answers3

Linked