Excel find formulas in cells

How to Find Cells containing Formulas in Excel

A few days back I had a huge spreadsheet in which I had to find out the cells containing formulas. Initially, I was totally clueless about how this task can be done.

But later after doing some Google searches, I got a few ideas on how I can effortlessly identify the formula cells in excel.

And today to share my experiences with you guys, In this post I will throw some light on a few methods that can help you to find out formula cells in your spreadsheets.

Method 1: Using ‘Go To Special’ Option:

In Excel ‘Go To Special’ is a very handy option when it comes to finding the cells with formulas. ‘Go to Special’ option has a radio button “Formulas” and selecting this radio button enables it to select all the cells containing formulas.

Later you can change the formatting or background color of the selected cells to make them stand out from the rest. Below is the step by step instructions for accomplishing this:

1. With your excel sheet opened navigate to the ‘Home’ tab > ‘Find & Select’ > ‘Go To Special’. Alternatively, you can also press ‘F5’ and then ‘Alt + S’ to open the ‘Go to Special’ dialog.

2. Next, in the ‘Go to Special’ window select the ‘Formulas’ radio button. After checking this radio button you will notice that few checkboxes (like Numbers, Errors, Logical, and Text) are enabled, these checkboxes signify the return type of the formulas.

So, if you select the ‘Formulas’ radio button and only check the ‘Numbers’ checkbox then it will just search the Formulas whose return type is a number. Here in our example, we will keep all of these return types checked.

3. After this click the ‘Ok’ button and all the cells that contain formulas get selected.

4. Next, without clicking anywhere on your spreadsheet change the background color of all the selected cells.

5. Now your formula cells can be easily identified.

Method 2: Using a built-in Excel formula

If you have worked with excel formulas then probably you may be knowing that excel has a formula that can find whether a cell contains a formula or not. The formula that I am talking about is:

Here ‘reference’ signifies the cell position which you wish to check for the presence of a formula.

For example: If you wish to check the cell ‘A2’ for the existence of a formula then you can use this function as

This function results in a Boolean output i.e. True or False. True signifies that the cell contains formulas while False tells that cell doesn’t contain any formulas.

Method 3: Using a Macro for identifying the cells that contain formulas:

I have created a VBA Macro that can find and color any cells that contain the formula in the total used range of the Active sheet. To use this macro simply follow the below procedure:

1. Open your spreadsheet and hit the ‘Alt + F11’ keys to open the VBA editor.

2. Next, navigate to ‘Insert‘ > ‘Module‘ and then paste the below macro in the editor.

3. For running this formula press the “F5” key.

4. This Macro will change the background colour of all the formula containing cells and thus makes it easier to identify them easily.

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FIND, FINDB functions

This article describes the formula syntax and usage of the FIND and FINDB functions in Microsoft Excel.

Description

FIND and FINDB locate one text string within a second text string, and return the number of the starting position of the first text string from the first character of the second text string.

These functions may not be available in all languages.

FIND is intended for use with languages that use the single-byte character set (SBCS), whereas FINDB is intended for use with languages that use the double-byte character set (DBCS). The default language setting on your computer affects the return value in the following way:

FIND always counts each character, whether single-byte or double-byte, as 1, no matter what the default language setting is.

FINDB counts each double-byte character as 2 when you have enabled the editing of a language that supports DBCS and then set it as the default language. Otherwise, FINDB counts each character as 1.

The languages that support DBCS include Japanese, Chinese (Simplified), Chinese (Traditional), and Korean.

Syntax

FIND(find_text, within_text, [start_num])

FINDB(find_text, within_text, [start_num])

The FIND and FINDB function syntax has the following arguments:

Find_text Required. The text you want to find.

Within_text Required. The text containing the text you want to find.

Start_num Optional. Specifies the character at which to start the search. The first character in within_text is character number 1. If you omit start_num, it is assumed to be 1.

FIND and FINDB are case sensitive and don’t allow wildcard characters. If you don’t want to do a case sensitive search or use wildcard characters, you can use SEARCH and SEARCHB.

If find_text is «» (empty text), FIND matches the first character in the search string (that is, the character numbered start_num or 1).

Find_text cannot contain any wildcard characters.

If find_text does not appear in within_text, FIND and FINDB return the #VALUE! error value.

If start_num is not greater than zero, FIND and FINDB return the #VALUE! error value.

If start_num is greater than the length of within_text, FIND and FINDB return the #VALUE! error value.

Use start_num to skip a specified number of characters. Using FIND as an example, suppose you are working with the text string «AYF0093.YoungMensApparel». To find the number of the first «Y» in the descriptive part of the text string, set start_num equal to 8 so that the serial-number portion of the text is not searched. FIND begins with character 8, finds find_text at the next character, and returns the number 9. FIND always returns the number of characters from the start of within_text, counting the characters you skip if start_num is greater than 1.

Examples

Copy the example data in the following table, and paste it in cell A1 of a new Excel worksheet. For formulas to show results, select them, press F2, and then press Enter. If you need to, you can adjust the column widths to see all the data.

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Use Excel built-in functions to find data in a table or a range of cells

Summary

This step-by-step article describes how to find data in a table (or range of cells) by using various built-in functions in Microsoft Excel. You can use different formulas to get the same result.

Create the Sample Worksheet

This article uses a sample worksheet to illustrate Excel built-in functions. Consider the example of referencing a name from column A and returning the age of that person from column C. To create this worksheet, enter the following data into a blank Excel worksheet.

You will type the value that you want to find into cell E2. You can type the formula in any blank cell in the same worksheet.

Term Definitions

This article uses the following terms to describe the Excel built-in functions:

The whole lookup table

The value to be found in the first column of Table_Array.

Lookup_Array
-or-
Lookup_Vector

The range of cells that contains possible lookup values.

The column number in Table_Array the matching value should be returned for.

3 (third column in Table_Array)

Result_Array
-or-
Result_Vector

A range that contains only one row or column. It must be the same size as Lookup_Array or Lookup_Vector.

A logical value (TRUE or FALSE). If TRUE or omitted, an approximate match is returned. If FALSE, it will look for an exact match.

This is the reference from which you want to base the offset. Top_Cell must refer to a cell or range of adjacent cells. Otherwise, OFFSET returns the #VALUE! error value.

This is the number of columns, to the left or right, that you want the upper-left cell of the result to refer to. For example, «5» as the Offset_Col argument specifies that the upper-left cell in the reference is five columns to the right of reference. Offset_Col can be positive (which means to the right of the starting reference) or negative (which means to the left of the starting reference).

Functions

LOOKUP()

The LOOKUP function finds a value in a single row or column and matches it with a value in the same position in a different row or column.

The following is an example of LOOKUP formula syntax:

The following formula finds Mary’s age in the sample worksheet:

The formula uses the value «Mary» in cell E2 and finds «Mary» in the lookup vector (column A). The formula then matches the value in the same row in the result vector (column C). Because «Mary» is in row 4, LOOKUP returns the value from row 4 in column C (22).

NOTE: The LOOKUP function requires that the table be sorted.

For more information about the LOOKUP function, click the following article number to view the article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:

VLOOKUP()

The VLOOKUP or Vertical Lookup function is used when data is listed in columns. This function searches for a value in the left-most column and matches it with data in a specified column in the same row. You can use VLOOKUP to find data in a sorted or unsorted table. The following example uses a table with unsorted data.

The following is an example of VLOOKUP formula syntax:

The following formula finds Mary’s age in the sample worksheet:

The formula uses the value «Mary» in cell E2 and finds «Mary» in the left-most column (column A). The formula then matches the value in the same row in Column_Index. This example uses «3» as the Column_Index (column C). Because «Mary» is in row 4, VLOOKUP returns the value from row 4 in column C (22).

For more information about the VLOOKUP function, click the following article number to view the article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:

INDEX() and MATCH()

You can use the INDEX and MATCH functions together to get the same results as using LOOKUP or VLOOKUP.

The following is an example of the syntax that combines INDEX and MATCH to produce the same results as LOOKUP and VLOOKUP in the previous examples:

The following formula finds Mary’s age in the sample worksheet:

The formula uses the value «Mary» in cell E2 and finds «Mary» in column A. It then matches the value in the same row in column C. Because «Mary» is in row 4, the formula returns the value from row 4 in column C (22).

NOTE: If none of the cells in Lookup_Array match Lookup_Value («Mary»), this formula will return #N/A.
For more information about the INDEX function, click the following article number to view the article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:

OFFSET() and MATCH()

You can use the OFFSET and MATCH functions together to produce the same results as the functions in the previous example.

The following is an example of syntax that combines OFFSET and MATCH to produce the same results as LOOKUP and VLOOKUP:

This formula finds Mary’s age in the sample worksheet:

The formula uses the value «Mary» in cell E2 and finds «Mary» in column A. The formula then matches the value in the same row but two columns to the right (column C). Because «Mary» is in column A, the formula returns the value in row 4 in column C (22).

For more information about the OFFSET function, click the following article number to view the article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:

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FIND Function

Summary

The Excel FIND function returns the position (as a number) of one text string inside another. When the text is not found, FIND returns a #VALUE error.

Purpose

Return value

Arguments

• find_text — The substring to find.
• within_text — The text to search within.
• start_num — [optional] The starting position in the text to search. Optional, defaults to 1.

Syntax

Usage notes

The FIND function returns the position (as a number) of one text string inside another. If there is more than one occurrence of the search string, FIND returns the position of the first occurrence. When the text is not found, FIND returns a #VALUE error. Also note, when find_text is empty, FIND returns 1. FIND does not support wildcards, and is always case-sensitive. Use the SEARCH function to find the position of text without case-sensitivity and with wildcard support.

Basic Example

The FIND function is designed to look inside a text string for a specific substring. When FIND locates the substring, it returns a position of the substring in the text as a number. If the substring is not found, FIND returns a #VALUE error. For example:

Note that text values entered directly into FIND must be enclosed in double-quotes («»).

Case-sensitive

The FIND function always case-sensitive:

TRUE or FALSE result

To force a TRUE or FALSE result, nest the FIND function inside the ISNUMBER function. ISNUMBER returns TRUE for numeric values and FALSE for anything else. If FIND locates the substring, it returns the position as a number, and ISNUMBER returns TRUE:

If FIND doesn’t locate the substring, it returns an error, and ISNUMBER returns FALSE.

Start number

The FIND function has an optional argument called start_num, that controls where FIND should begin looking for a substring. To find the first match of «the» in any combination of upper or lowercase, you can omit start_num, which defaults to 1:

To start searching at character 5, enter 4 for start_num:

Wildcards

The FIND function does not support wildcards. See the SEARCH function.

If cell contains

To return a custom result with the SEARCH function, use the IF function like this:

Instead of returning TRUE or FALSE, the formula above will return «Yes» if substring is found and «No» if not.

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