diff --git a/core/src/processing/data/Table.java b/core/src/processing/data/Table.java
index 61817d516..657fd6e5d 100644
--- a/core/src/processing/data/Table.java
+++ b/core/src/processing/data/Table.java
@@ -4067,6 +4067,11 @@ public class Table {
     }
     setColumnCount(lastColumn + 1);
 
+    // trim() works from both sides
+    while (getColumnCount() > 0 && isEmptyArray(getStringColumn(0))) {
+      removeColumn(0);
+    }
+
     // remove empty rows (starting from the end)
     int lastRow = lastRowIndex();
     //while (isEmptyRow(lastRow) && lastRow >= 0) {
@@ -4074,6 +4079,10 @@ public class Table {
       lastRow--;
     }
     setRowCount(lastRow + 1);
+
+    while (getRowCount() > 0 && isEmptyArray(getStringRow(0))) {
+      removeRow(0);
+    }
   }
 
 
diff --git a/core/todo.txt b/core/todo.txt
index fb384dbc2..e0f598d8b 100644
--- a/core/todo.txt
+++ b/core/todo.txt
@@ -6,6 +6,8 @@ X make trim() work on column titles as well
 o add trimRows() and trimColumns()
 o   would you ever use one w/o the other?
 X   just make this part of trim()
+X also remove rows/columns from beginning
+X   since that's what trim() on strings does
 X consume Unicode BOM (0xFEFF) in createReader() and Table parser
 o no prompt shows with selectInput() on 10.11 and 10.12
 X   https://github.com/processing/processing/issues/4758