# Reshape columns into rows

> When column names are really values - years, states, dates, survey questions - reshape them into rows so you can group and chart by them.

Prepare · 4 min read · Updated 2026-08-27

Plenty of real spreadsheets put values in the column headers - a column per year, a column per state, a column per survey question. Golden treats each of those as a separate measure, which means you cannot group or chart by the thing the headers actually represent. Reshaping turns those columns into rows and fixes that.

## Run a reshape

1. Open the Prepare view of your dataset.
2. Open the transformation menu and find the "Table Shape" group.
3. Choose "Reshape Columns to Rows" - its description reads "Turn year/state/date columns into rows".
4. In the dialog titled "Reshape columns into rows", check which columns are selected and what the new columns will be called.
5. Click Reshape.

## What the dialog asks for

- New column for the names - where the old column headers go. Golden pre-fills this from what it detected, so a run over year columns suggests a year-shaped name.
- New column for the values - where the numbers go. Defaults to Value.
- Split one column into separate measures - keep everything in one values column (the default), or give each value of a chosen column its own column so those measures stay chartable separately.
- An "After" band previews the result, along with the projected row count.

> **Note:** If no sample rows are loaded you will see "No sample rows loaded, so there's nothing to preview - the reshape will still apply to the full table." The transformation runs against the whole table either way.

## Golden offers it when it notices

You do not have to spot the problem yourself. Prepare shows a banner when a run of columns looks like values rather than measures, naming what it saw - year values, state values, date values, period values, or responses to one survey question - with a "Reshape..." button beside it.

Discover raises the same thing before it builds anything, in a card headed with the count of columns it found. There you get three choices: "Reshape automatically", which applies it and re-runs Discover on the new shape; "Review it first", which opens the reshape in Prepare so you can change the selection and the new column names; and "Keep it as it is".

## The two-pane picker for surveys

Survey tables usually want most columns reshaped and a handful kept. For those, the reshape shows two panes - "Become rows" and "Stay as columns" - with a filter box over each and buttons to move a selection between them. Columns you keep are tagged as Identifier or Demographic so you can tell respondent keys apart from the things you want to segment by.

> **Tip:** A reshape is a recorded step like any other transformation, so you can undo it from the data prep history if the new shape is not what you wanted.

> **Warning:** The Table Shape group is filtered by connection type. Live SQL connections that query your warehouse in place do not offer reshape - import the data first.

Source: https://goldenanalytics.com/docs/reshape-columns-to-rows