Automatically clear junk entries in an Excel PivotTable report

When the source data for an Excel PivotTable report changes, you typically need to refresh the PivotTable report to update the changed data to the PivotTable report. However, some data items that have disappeared in the source data remain in the Drop-down filtered list of row or column fields.

To clear these Excel PivotTable "junk" entries, in addition to the common methods for manually removing and resuming fields, you can also set up the PivotTable report for automatic cleanup by setting. The method is as follows.

Select any cell in the PivotTable report, and under the Options ribbon, click PivotTable → options to open the PivotTable Options dialog box. In the Data tab, change the number of items reserved for each field to none, and OK to exit. Finally, refresh the PivotTable report and the junk entry will be cleared automatically.