Table of contents 1. Excel in English 2. Important information 3. LAYOUT 4. Format Painter 5. Format Painter 6. Fix columns 7. Fix columns 8. Create a grid 9. Create a grid 10. Create a numeric sequence 11. Create a filter
12. Filter after color 13. Remove filter 14. Conditional formatting 15. Conditional formatting 16. Hide 17. Group 18. Remove duplicates 19. Remove duplicates 20. PivotTable 21. PivotTable 22. PivotTable 23. FORMULAS 24. Combine text 25. SumIf
26. SumIf 27. Countif 28. Countif 29. Find and Replace 30. Multiplication och Sum 31. Subtotal 32. Equal to = 33. Logical operators 34. If 35. And 36. Or 37. Max and Min 38. Upper and lower 39. Proper and Trim
40. Left and Right 41. Mid 42. Text to Columns 43. Text to Columns 44. Text to Columns 45. Vlookup 46. Iferror 47. Index and Match 48. Index and Match 49. Search and Find 50. Randbetween 51. SHORTCUTS 52. Helpful shortcuts
Excel in English Formulas in Excel are different depending on which language you have installed Excel in, I therefore recommend you to have it in English Click here to go to Office's own page and get instructions on how to change language
Important information Depending on the settings in your computer, the formulas will work differently. You should either use semicolon ; or comma, when you are creating formulas. In this guide we will be using semicolons in the formulas.
LAYOUT How can we make the data look good?
Format Painter - Does your data look like this sometimes when you are copying text from the Internet? Format Painer is one of my favorite tools in Excel. When the data or text that I have copied from Internet looks strange, I normally go a few columns (steps) to right and write: "hi". This "hi" will then be in normal text and you can choose to have the same settings in this cell as in the other cells. What you do in this example is to go to column D3 (hi) and click on Format painter.
Format Painter If you are in cell D3 (hi), click on Format Painter and mark column A and B. You mark these columns by clicking on A and then drag the mouse towards B. You will now mark all data that are in column A and B. The result will then be this! All data is in the same font, color and style as "hi". Nice, right? All you need to do now is to make the headlines more clear.
Fix columns Are the text strings too long to be fully visible? If you go between A and B, you can choose to "drag out" column A. If you are doing this with multiple columns, it might be difficult to make the data look good and get it equally long. But there is an easy solution! If you choose to double-click between columns A and B (The dash between column A and B that looks like this ). The column will then be exactly as long as what is needed in order to show all names in that column. Just make sure to not do this with really long texts because then the columns will be way too long as well.
Fix columns To double click between A and B works well when you don't have too many columns to fix. In this example, there are eight columns that need to be fixed and then there is an easier way to solve it. Click on A and then drag the mouse towards column H to mark all columns. Double click between A and B, in the same way as the last example. The result will then be that you have changed all columns that you have marked and you get a perfect overview right away. Same here as in previous example, make sure to not have too long texts because then it will be difficult to navigate in the Excel file.
Create a grid Do you need to create name tags at work and having a difficult time making sure the tags will be the same size? Instead of double clicking like we did in the last example, you can click and then drag the mouse in order to decide the exact width you want on the columns. In this example, I have clicked between A and B and then dragged the mouse to the right in order to get the columns to be 100 pixels wide. It is also possible to change the height by clicking on "1" and then drag the mouse downwards to mark the rows you want to change. You do this exactly the same way as you change the columns. In this example, rows 1 to 8 are marked and the height is changed to 48 pixels.
Create a grid We now have all the cells in the same size, both for height and width! To make it look even better, we need to create borders so you can see the cells even more clearly. You can make this by marking all cells that you want as a name tag and then click on "Borders" and then "All Borders". The end result will then be name tags that are 100% guaranteed to be in the same size! You can of course change the name tag for numbers in order to make the data looks better if you want to present it.
Create a numeric sequence Do you need to create a numeric sequence? Go to the corner of a cell, in this example cell A1. When the mouse changes to a small black cross, click and drag the mouse down to create a numeric sequence. The result will then be this numeric sequence and you don't have to write the numbers one by one. In some cases you need to click and hold "ctrl" before you click with the mouse and then drag it down to make it work. You can also do this with dates.
Create a filter Creating a filter is one of the most common functions for me in Excel. Under the tab "Home", you can find "Sort & Filter". Click on "Filter" to create a filter to your data. You can also use the shortcut "Ctrl + Shift + L". I really recommend you to remember this shortcut! There are basically no limitations now that you have created a filter. The most common thing to do for me is to sort things in the order of size. You can do this by clicking on "Sort Z to A". If you are looking for a special company, you can search for it directly in the filter and you will find it.
Filter after color Has your manager looked through your data and marked interesting and not so interesting companies based on color? Instead of going through these manually, you can filter the data based on color. You do this by clicking on the arrow down and then the filter options will appear. You can now choose to "Sort by Color" or "Filter by Color". The result will then be this after deciding to only show cells with green background. This is the easiest way to get a quick overview for which numbers the manager found interesting!
Remove filter To remove a filter, you can click on "Filter" or use the shortcut again (Ctrl + Shift + L). If you have filtered in different cells, for example column A, H, L, M & S, the easiest solution is to click on "Clear" in order to remove all filters you have created.
Conditional formatting Conditional formatting is perfect if you want to create a nice and quick overview for the person you will share the document with. To do this, you should mark all the cells you want to use, in this example cells C1-C16 are marked. Click thereafter on "Conditional Formatting" and then "New Rule". From there, we can choose the conditions for what to be displayed.
Conditional formatting The idea is that all numbers that are higher than 750,000 should be marked as green automatically. You can do this by first clicking on: "Format only cells that contain", "greater than" and then manually write 750,000. To finalize this, you need to click on "Format..." and in that menu click on "Fill". You can now choose color and then click on "OK". All cells with a value greater than 750,000 will now be green. You can add additional colors to your data if you, for example, wish to have the color red for cells with value lower than 600,000.
Hide If you have too many columns and feel that some of them are unnecessary but you still need them in the sheet, you can choose to right click on "B" and then choose "Hide". The result will be that the column B gets hidden and it will be easier to navigate in the document. If you want to see your hidden columns, you can in this example mark Cell A to C and click on "Unhide".
Group Click on "Data" and then "Group". After clicking on "Group", the columns that you have grouped will have a small plus sign "+" above them. By clicking on the plus sign the grouped columns be displayed. To hide again, just click on the minus sign that appeared instead of the plus sign. With "Group", you can easily show and hide columns. Mark the columns you want to hide, in this example B, C and D.
Remove duplicates Do you have a list with names and are unsure if the same name is appearing many times in the list? "Remove Duplicates" is the function that will solve this. In this list, there are two "Fredrik" and "Paul". The function "Remove duplicated" will remove so the names are only being displayed once.
Remove duplicates First click on column A in order mark all data. Thereafter, click on "Data" and then "Remove duplicates". The box that appears will look like this. Just click on "OK" to remove duplicated names on the list. The end result will then be that Paul and Fredrik are only once on the list!
PivotTable PivotTable will make you summarize data in an efficient and easy way! Have you ever been given a list where all salespeople have been writing their names and how much they have sold for and you want to summarize that data? There are multiple ways to solve this issue and one of them is with PivotTable. Mark all data (Click on A+B) and then "Insert" and finally "PivotTable".
PivotTable After clicking on "OK", this box will appear. You can choose again which data that should be in the PivotTable but since you already marked data in the step before there is no need to change anything. You can also choose where the data should be placed, in a new worksheet or in the same worksheet as you are currently using. In this example are we not changing any data and just proceed by clicking "OK".
PivotTable The last step will be to click on the box next to "Salesperson" and "Sales". You will now get a quick overview and see that John is a top-seller and Fredrik is not performing to well. If you don't want to see the total sum people have sold for, you can click on "Sum of Sales" under the headline Values. By clicking you will see "Value Field Settings" appear and you can then change the number of sales (Maybe John was just lucky with one sale?), average value and both the highest and lowest number.
FORMULAS Calculate, calculate, calculate
Combine text Is the information in different cells and you would like to combine it? Always start a formula with =, then click on cell A2, write a &-sign and finally click on B2 to combine all information to one cell. Every time you want a new cell to be in the combination, just add an additional &-sign and enter the cell you wish to include in the formula. As you can see in the image in the left column, the data has been combined without taking spaces into account. In order to add spaces between the data you are combining, the formula has to be corrected to the =A2&" "&B2. The two quotation marks with a space in between them marks the location for where space will be put: between A2 and B2. The space can be replaced with a word if desired.
SumIf Do you need to summarize what each salesperson has sold for and you don't want to use a PivotTable? Then you can use SumIf. Start by selecting from where you want to collect all the information, in this case the salespersons' names. After that, we will match the name with the salesperson (D2) with the information that is already chosen (A2:A14). The final step will be to choose which information that should be gathered when the information is matched. You should then choose the cells B2:B14. Between these steps, it is important to use semicolon ;. Important is also to anchor the formula by putting dollar signs around the numbers and letters in the cell. The formula will look like this: =SUMIF(A2:A14;D2;B2:B14). After anchoring, it will be: =SUMIF($A$2:$A$14;D2;$B$2:$B$14).
SumIf There are always many solutions for a problem in Excel. Go to the right corner of a cell until the mouse changes to the shape of a small cross. You can now choose between click and drag down the mouse or just double-click. To double-click is of course faster. The final result will then look like this and you can find out what each salesperson has sold for. If you want to create this formula and have it unlimited, in case someone fills in with more information later on, the formula should be =SUMIF(A:A;D2;B:B).
Countif Do you want to know who is coming to the Christmas or Summer party? Do you have a document where people have responded and you quickly want to know how much food that must be ordered? You can then use =COUNTIF(..;..). In this example, we are using =COUNTIF(B2:B19;D1). B2:B19 is for where the formula should look for the responses, in this case: "Yes". D1 in the formula is the criterion, the people who has responded "Yes". We should order food for eleven people! Except for the ones who haven't responded yet... If you need to know how many have responded no, you change the formula to =COUNTIF(B2:B19:E1). E1 will in this case be the criterion and the formula will show who has responded no.
Countif In order to find the people that have not responded, we need to change the formula. There are a few that have not responded, but we can not have "Not responded" as a criteria and we therefore need to change it to =COUNTIF(B2:B19;""). As earlier mentioned in this guide, you can use quotation marks to write texts in formulas. If you don't have any text between the quotation marks it will be counted as a blank cell. The result of the formula will therefore be that 4 people have not answered.
Find and Replace If you have a lot of data or text in your document that need to be replaced it can easily be executed by using "Find and Replace". This can simply be done by pressing "Ctrl + F", but also by going to "Home" and then "Find & Select". There are two different tabs: "Find" and "Replace". Choose "Replace" and fill in the two rows which need be filled in. In this example, we would like to replace "apples" with "oranges". After having clicked on either "Replace all" or "Replace", all the apples have been replaced with oranges.
Multiplication och Sum If you need to multiply two cells with each other, place * between the two cells. Formula becomes =A2*B2. In order to summarize data or values, use a plus sign between the cells. For example, A1+B1+C1. If you have many cells to summarize it may took long time and it would therefore be convenient to use the Sum formula instead. In that formula you only need to enter the cells that you would like to summarize. Do so by writing =SUM and the specific cells you would like to include. In this case we want to summarize cells C2 to C8.
Subtotal In case you have a filter and have chose to filter only on companies from the Industry "Transport", the Sum formula will still show the total value for all companies, even though a filter has been added. If you would like to know the total value of all visible companies, use the Subtotal formula. In this example, we would like to find out total revenue for all transportation companies. Start by writing =SUBTOTAL( followed by the function you wish to use for Subtotal. There are multiple functions for Subtotal, and in this example we would like to summarize cells and therefore use the number 9. The final formula therefore becomes the following: =SUBTOTAL(9;C1:C22).
Equal to = Simple but very useful. To put cell A2 as equal to B2, like the image above, you will receive information if the values are equal to each other or not. If equal, output value will show "True" and if not equal the value will show "False". Paul Johnson (A2) is equal to Paul Johnson (B2) and is therefore given the value "True". Anna Johnson (A3) is not equal to Fredrik Johnson (B3) and value is therefore "False".
Logical operators If you would like to compare values with each other you need use logical operators. In the first example, we have entered that if A2 (1235) is greater than C2 (14). A2 is obviously greater than C2, and the result therefore becomes "True" In case you fell asleep in math class: > Greater than < Less than >= Greater than or equal to <= Less than or equal to By using the logical operators above you will be able to get values "True" or "False".
If Do you need to do an analysis regarding which companies to contact based on their revenues? To use the IF formula together with logical operators make it possible to process data faster and will give you a good overview. In this example we only want to contact companies that have total revenue greater 100,000. The formula therefore becomes =IF(A2>100000;"Yes";"No"). It will check if A2 is greater 100,000, and if so, the result will be yes. If not, the result will be "No". From there on you can add filters and contact the companies that you are interested in.
And With the IF(AND formula will you be able to enter multiple criteria that has to be fulfilled. If all criteria is fulfilled, it will show, in this example: "Yes". Start the formula with =IF(AND( followed by if the revenue is greater than 100,000, only for those companies active within IT/Data. Formula then becomes =IF(AND(A2>100000;C2="IT/Data");"Yes";"No"). If you want to add two more criteria, enter those after having written semicolons. For example: =IF(AND(100000;C2;"IT/Data";xx<xx);"Yes";"No") The last part of the formula becomes either "Yes" or "No". "Yes" will be shown if all criteria is fulfilled and "No" if not. The outcome shows that we should only contact company 1 and 7, but not company 8 for example as its revenue is less than 100,000. The other companies will not be contacted as well as they are not active in within IT/Data.
Or Unlike the And formula, the Or formula will show "Yes" if only one criterion is fulfilled.the example above uses the same criteria as in the And formula. The only adjustment you need to do is to replace "AND" with "OR". Formula therefore becomes =IF(OR(A2>100000;C2="IT/Data");"Yes";"No"). Conclusion therefore becomes to contact those companies that have greater than 100,000 in revenue and/or those companies active within IT/Data. Only company 3 and 6 will not be contacted as they do not fulfill any of the criteria: their revenue is less than 100,00 and are not active within IT/Data. If you would like to add more criteria, you can do so in the same way as in the And formula (previous page).
Max and Min Do you need to identify the greatest value in one or more columns? Use the Max formula like in this example where column B is selected =MAX(B2:B12). In this case, the greatest value is 22061. In order to find the lowest value in column B, we simply write =MIN(B2:B12).
Upper and lower Do you want your text in upper case letters only? If so, you can use the Upper formula. In this case, we can wrote =UPPER(A1). Feel like the opposite and just want lower case letters. The formula is the same as the Upper formula, but you know write =LOWER(A2).
Proper and Trim Let's make the data look good! With the Proper formula, the first letter becomes upper case and the rest lower case. In the example above we have used =PROPER(A2). If the cells would happen have two or more spaces, you can easily trim these spaces with the Trim formula. Above we have entered =TRIM(A2).
Left and Right By using Left formula, we can extract specific parts of data. In addition to the Left formula, we can also use the Mid or Right formula. In the example above, we are using =LEFT(A2;4). With this input we are confirming that we want to extract the first four numbers of cell A2. The value therefore becomes "2016" as those were the first four numbers of cell A2. If you, instead, enter =RIGHT(A2;2), the value would have been "01" since those are the last two numbers of cell A2.
Mid The Mid formula can be used to extract certain information from a cell. For example, if you have the exact date when the sale happened but only wish to present which month. Mid is the perfect formula to use. Above, column A indicates date and column B shows the sale for that date. In order to extract which month we enter the following: =MID(A2;6;2). A2 indicates which cell we fetch the information from, number 6 lets Excel know which number where the function should start. The last number, 2, tells Excel how many numbers we want to show. Now column C shows the extracted information, which in this case is the month of each specific date. Row 2 therefore indicates that sale happened in January, and row 13 shows sales in December.
Text to Columns Have a look at the image above. Does not this happen quite often when exporting Excel documents from the internet? Reason for this is due to Excel's list separator, which can either be commas or semicolons. If errors occur, you most likely have the wrong settings but they can easily be adjusted. Go to your computer's control panel and make adjustments under "time & language". If you do not wish to make this change, you can use the "Text to Columns" function.
Text to Columns In order to restructure this text, click on column A, then "Data" and finally "Text to Columns". Make sure to click on column where text was first entered, in this example it is column A. I always tend to check "Delimited" as I have found it to be an easier way of working.
Text to Columns Next step is to check "Comma" and use that as a separator. While doing this, you will see that the text changes and gets structured in to different cells. This is the result! All the information has now been divided into different cells and the data can be used as any other.
Vlookup My favorite formula! Do you have information from two different sheets or two separate documents and wish to combine the information? In this example we are going to fetch information from a different sheet in a document. The two images from the different sheets that we would like to combine. In this case, we would like to add which "Industry" to the image above in cell A2 ("Company 5"). The right image contains which "Industry" each respective "Company" is connected to.
Iferror If you think or know that your formula is going to create values like #ERROR or #N/A, you can write =IFERROR before initiating your formula. This allows all the cells with such values to replaced with a text or number that you have chosen. In the above example is a VLOOKUP where certain values cannot be found. We therefore enter =IFERROR(in the beginning and the end we write "Not found"). The cell values of E5. E8 and E10 therefore becomes "Not found".
Index and Match By using Index and Match formulas together, you can create a powerful lookup formula. In contrast to VLOOKUP, the Index + Match formula carries no restriction about the the value having to be in the first column. With Index and Match you specify which row or column the value should be placed in, as well as which row or column's value should be fetched. In this example we are searching with Match in order to find the value of column A for "Company 4". Note: in the "Array" criterion you must select "Company 4" as well as the answer you wish to receive (685,020.02 )
Index and Match Using an Index formula allows you to fetch information from any cell in the are you selected in step 1 of the formula. In this example row 5 is used as well as the first column. The formula therefore becomes =INDEX(A:C;5;1). Number 5 indicates the row, and number 1 represents which column the information is gathered from. The Match formula is similar to VLOOKUP. The Match formula lets you look up which position in a column or row where a set criterion is fulfilled. In the example above we are looking for the criterion "Company 6". The formula therefore becomes =MATCH("Company 6";B:B;0). The output therefore becomes the number 7 as the criterion can be found on row 7.
Search and Find The search formula allows you to identify the position of a certain letter in a word or name. In the example above, we are searching for the letter "S" and want to identify its position in the names. The formula therefore becomes =SEARCH("S";A2;1). Specifically, we are asking the formula to search for "S" in cell A2. Number 1 in the formula indicates that we wish to start the search in the beginning of the name. If we would have entered the number 3 instead, the formula would have started the search for "S" three letters in. The Find formula works in the same way as the Search formula. The only difference being that the Find formula is case sensitive. The Find formula becomes =FIND("S";A2;1). Note that the formula is only set on finding lower case "s" among the names. Since there is no lower case "s" in "Smith", the formula shows: #VALUE.
Randbetween Do you need random numbers in a certain numerical interval? If yes, then use the Randbetween formula. Enter values in two cells. In the example above, the two different values are 500,000 (D1) and 1,000,000 (E1). Apply the formula by entering =RANDBETWEEN(D1;E1). Complete the formula by anchoring D1 and E1. Anchoring is done by inserting dollar sign in front of the letters and numbers. Depending on your settings, Fn-key + F4-key or simply F4-key can be used as shortcut for anchoring. Make sure the Excel file does not close as the F4-key is also shortcut to close the program on certain computers.
SHORTCUTS Become more efficient
Helpful shortcuts These are the shortcuts that I use most frequently. Challenge yourself and learn them by heart! Move as far down as possible: Ctrl + down arrow key (no need to ever scroll again) Move as far up as possible: Ctrl + up arrow key (no need to ever scroll again) Move as far right as possible: Ctrl + right arrow key Move as far left as possible: Ctrl + right arrow key The four shortcuts above can also be combined by entering Ctrl + shift + (arrow key) in order to select data. Search: Ctrl + F Search and replace: Ctrl + H Save: Ctrl + S Print: Ctrl + P Open new document: Ctrl + N Cancel ongoing cell editing: Esc Delete information in selected cell: Delete Delete information in a cell: Backspace Start a formula: = Bold text: Ctrl + F Italic text: Ctrl + K Underline text: Ctrl + U Copy text: Ctrl + C Cut text: Ctrl + X Paste text: Ctrl + V Undo last action: Ctrl + Z Do you have two Excel documents open? Click Ctrl + Tab in order easily switch between the documents.