diff --git a/src/PhpWord/Writer/HTML/Element/Table.php b/src/PhpWord/Writer/HTML/Element/Table.php
index a6f14792f8..059574a272 100644
--- a/src/PhpWord/Writer/HTML/Element/Table.php
+++ b/src/PhpWord/Writer/HTML/Element/Table.php
@@ -52,6 +52,7 @@ public function write()
                 for ($j = 0; $j < $rowCellCount; $j++) {
                     $cellStyle = $rowCells[$j]->getStyle();
                     $cellBgColor = $cellStyle->getBgColor();
+                    $cellBgColor === 'auto' && $cellBgColor = null; // auto cannot be parsed to hexadecimal number
                     $cellFgColor = null;
                     if ($cellBgColor) {
                         $red = hexdec(substr($cellBgColor, 0, 2));