Imagine carefully creating a workbook with several calculations and formulas only see errors. What to do when you get an Excel formula error? Of course, you can shake your head and ask, “Why, why would you do that?”, but that will not help.
So in this article let’s learn how to fix Excel formula error. Those annoying #SOMETHING!s that you see when your excel formulas have something wrong with them.
Excel Formula Error Checklist
Use this checklist to quickly understand common formula errors, what they mean, when you would see them and how to fix them. Read on to know more about the errors.
| Error | What it means? | Most common reason | How to fix it? |
|---|---|---|---|
| #N/A | Not Applicable | When VLLOKUP can't find what you want | Make sure your list has the value you are looking for. Use IFERROR or IFNA to fix |
| #DIV/0! | Divide by Zero | Denominator is zero | Use IF formula to safe divide |
| #NAME? | Could not find the name | Spelling mistake / typo | Double check your formula and fix the error |
| ######### | Could not display or format | Cell too small | Adjust column width |
| #VALUE! | Invalid value | Converting non-dates or numbers | Make sure your dates are correctly formatted |
| #REF! | Reference missing | When you delete a row / column / cell | Check cell dependancies before deleting |
| #NUM! | Invalid number | Number too high or too low | Check your calculation |
| #NULL! | Missing or null value | Reference points to nothing | See if your references are right |
#N/A Formula Error
This is one of the most frequent excel formula error you see while using vlookup formula. The N/A error is shown when some data is missing, or inappropriate arguments are passed to the lookup functions (vlookup, hlookup etc.) of if the list is not sorted and you are trying to lookup using sort option. You can also generate a #N/A error by writing =NA() in a cell.
How to fix #N/A error?
Make sure you wrap the lookup functions with some error handling mechanism. For eg. if you are not sure the value you are looking is available, you can write something like =IFERROR(VLOOKUP(…), “Value not found”). This will print “value not found” whenever the vlookup returns any error (including #N/A)
Related: Learn more about IFERROR formula
#DIV/0! Formula Error
This is the easiest of all. When you divide something with 0, you see this error. For eg. a cell with the formula =23/0 would return in this error.
How to fix #DIV/0 error?
Simple, use IF formula to safe divide, like this:
=IF(A2=0, “”, A1/A2)
#NAME? Formula Error
The most common reason why you see this error is because you misspelled a formula or table or named range. For eg. if you write =summa(a1:a10) in a cell, it would return #NAME? error. There are few other reasons why this can happen. If you forget to close a text in double quotes or omit the range operator :. All these examples should return #NAME? error. =sum(range1, UNDEFIED_RANGE_NAME), =sum(a1a10)
How to fix #NAME? Error?
- Make sure you have mentioned the correct formula name. Use auto-complete when typing formulas. This way, when you type formulas or use names / structural references, you will not make any mistakes.
- Make sure you have defined all the tables and named ranges you are using in the formula.
- Make sure any user defined functions you are using are properly installed.
- Double check the ranges and string parameters in your formulas.
###### Error
You see a cell full of # symbols when the contents cannot fit in the cell. For eg. a long number like 2339432094394 entered in a small cell will show ####s. Also, you see the ###### when you format negative numbers as dates.
How to fix the ###### error?
Simple, adjust the column width. And if the error is due to negative dates, make them positive.
#VALUE! Excel Formula Error
Value error is shown when you use text parameters to a function that accepts numbers. For eg. the formula =SUM(“ab”,”cd”) returns #VALUE! error.
How to fix the #VALUE! error?
Make sure your formula parameters have correct data types. If you are using functions that work on numbers (like sum, sumproduct etc.) then the parameters should be numbers.
#REF! Formula Error
This is one of the most common error messages you see when you fiddle with a worksheet full of formulas. You get #REF! Excel formula error when one of the formula parameters is pointing to an invalid range. This can happen because you deleted the cells. For eg. try to write a sum forumla like =SUM(A1:A10, B1:B10, C1:C10) and then delete the column C. Immediately the sum formula returns #REF! error.
How to fix the #REF! error?
First press ctrl+Z and undo the actions you have performed. And then rethink if there is a better way to write the formula or perform the action (deleting cells).
#NUM! Excel Error
This is number error that you see when your formula returns a value bigger than what excel can represent. You will also get this error if you are using iterative functions like IRR and the function cannot find any result. For eg. the formula =4389^7E+37 returns a #NUM! error.
How to fix #NUM! error?
Simple, make your numbers smaller or provide right starting values to your iterative formulas.
#NULL! Formula Error
This is rare error. When you use incorrect range operators often you get this error. For eg. the formula =SUM(D30:D32 C31:C33) returns a #NULL! error because there is no overlap between range 1 and range2.
How to fix the #NULL! error?
Make sure you have mentioned the ranges properly.
Formula not working – showing as text?
If you don’t see any error, but instead of seeing the result, all you see is your formula (like below), then check out Formulas not working page for information how to fix the problem.
Further Reading on Excel Formula Debugging
Formula Debugging using F9 Key
Learn to work with Circular References
Understand the difference between absolute and relative references
How to work with tables & structural references
Detect errors in your formulas [Office.com]
How to use new ERROR.TYPE formula to work with errors
Tell me how you debug formulas? What is the most common error you get?
What is the strangest and most confusing error you have seen? Please share in the comments so we can all have a laugh and find a way to fix the problem.
12 Responses to “29 Excel Formula Tips for all Occasions [and proof that PHD readers truly rock]”
Some great contributions here.
Gotta love the Friday 13th formula 😀
Great tips from you all! Thanks a lot for sharing! bsamson, particularly you helped me on a terribly annoying task. 🙂
(BTW, Chandoo, it's not exactly "Find if a range is normally distributed" what my suggestion does. It checks if two proportions are statistically different. I probably gave you a bad explanation on twitter, but it'd be probably better if you fix it here... 🙂 )
Great compilation Chandoo
For the "Clean your text before you lookup"
=VLOOKUP(CLEAN(TRIM(E20)),F5:G18,2,0)
I would like to share a method to convert a number-stored-as-text before you lookup:
=VLOOKUP(E20+0,F5:G18,2,0)
@Peder, yeah, I loved that formula
@Aires: Sorry, I misunderstood your formula. Corrected the heading now.
@John.. that is a cool tip.
Hey Chandoo,
That p-value formula is really great for a statistics person like me.
What a p-value essentially is, is the probability that the results obtained from a statistical test aren't valid. So for example, if my p value is .05, there's a 5% probability that my results are wrong.
You can play with this if you install the Data Analysis Toolpak (which will perform some statistical tests for you AND provide the P Value.)
Let's say for example I've got two weeks of data (separated into columns) with the number of hours worked per day. I want to find out if the total number of hours I worked in week two were really all the different than week one.
Week1 Week2
10 11
12 9
9 10
7 8
5 8
Go to Data > Data Analysis > T-Test Assuming Unequal Variances > OK
In the Variable 1 Box, select the range of data for week 1.
In the Variable 2 Box, select the range of data for week 2.
Check "Labels"
In the Alpha box, select a value (in percentage terms) for how tolerant you are of error.
.05 is the general standard; that is to say I am willing to accept a 95% level of confidence that my result is accuarate.
Select a range output.
Excel calculates a number of results: Average (mean) for each week's data, etc.
You'll notice however that there are two P Values; one-tail and two-tail. (one tail tests are for > or .05), the number of hours I worked in week two is statistically equivalent to the number of hours I worked in week one.
So here’s a way you might want to use this. You put up a new entry on your blog. You think it’s the best entry ever! So you pull your webstats for this week and compare it to last week. You gather data for each week on the length of time a visitor spends on your website. The question you’re trying to prove statistically is whether there’s an average increase in the amount of time spent on your website this week as compared to last week (as a result of your fancy new blog post). You can run the same statistical test I illustrated above to find out. Incidentally, it matters very little to the stat test whether the quantity of visitors differs or not.
Anyhow, the Data Analysis toolpack doesn't perform a lot of stat tests that folks like me would like to have access to. In those cases I have to either use different software, or write some very complicated mathematical formulas. Having this p-value formula makes my life a LOT easier!
Thanks!
Eric~
Fantastic stuf..One line explanation is cool.
Thanks to all the contributors
OS
Take FirstName, MI, LastName in access (you can fix it to work in excel) capitalize first letter of each and lowercase the rest and add ". " if MI exists then same for last name:
Full Name: Format(Left([FirstName],1),">") & Format(Right([FirstName]),Len([FirstName])-1),"") & ". ","") & Format(Left([LastName],1),">") & Format(Right([LastName],Len([LastName])-1),"<")
I teach excel, access, etc etc for a living and i have my access students build this formula one step at a time from the inside out to show how formulas can be made even if it looks complicated. Yes I know I could just do IsNull([MI]) and reverse the order in the Iif() function but the point here is to nest as many functions as possible one by one (also I illustrate how it will fail without the Not() as it is)
Extract the month from a date
The easiest formula for this is =MONTH(a1)
It will return a 1 for January, 2 for February etc.
if in a column we write the value of total person for eg. 10 if we spent 1.33 paise each person then how we get total amount in next column and the result will in round form plzzzzz solve my problem sir................... thank u
@Anjali
If the value 10 is in B2 and 1.33 paise is in C2 the formula in D2 could be =B2*C2
If the values are a column of values you can copy the formula down by copy/paste or drag the small black handle at the bottom right corner of cell D2
kindly share with me new forumulas.
How to convert a figure like 870.70 into 870 but 871.70 into 880 using excel formula ? Please help.