Excel University Blog

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Functions

Last Date in Column

By Jeff Lenning | July 23, 2024 |

Hello and welcome to our latest tutorial! Today we’re diving into a common Excel challenge: finding the last date in a column. This is especially useful if you add rows to your data regularly. Let’s explore three different exercises to solve this problem. Video Tutorial Exercise 1: Using the TAKE Function in a Table Step-by-Step…

Turn a Table of Events into a Graphical Calendar

By Jeff Lenning | July 16, 2024 |

Today, we’re tackling the following question: How do you create a calendar that can show multiple events per day in Excel? We’re going to transform a simple table of events into a dynamic, graphical calendar. Let’s dive right in! Objective In summary, we have a list of events stored in a Table named Table1, like…

Avoid XLOOKUP Errors

By Jeff Lenning | June 25, 2024 |

This article will help you navigate the waters of common XLOOKUP errors and issues. We’ll first begin by identifying errors, issues, and unexpected results. Then we’ll talk about specific ways to avoid and address each one. I hope this article will help you be able to use this wonderful function more effectively in your workbooks!…

Replace 25+ Nested IFs with a Single Simple Lookup

By Jeff Lenning | June 11, 2024 |

I was recently asked the following question: “I have a drop-down with 25+ categories that determines the fee percentage. Can I use an IF function to compute the fee based on the selected category?” I answer this question in this post. Video Objective Let’s begin by understanding the objective and the question. There is an…

Get Last Data Row from PivotTable

By Jeff Lenning | June 4, 2024 |

The post was written to answer a question I recently received: How can we retrieve the last row from a PivotTable? Buckle up as we solve this challenge by nesting two Excel functions into a single formula. Video Step-by-step Let’s visualize the essenence of the question. We have a PivotTable in our worksheet, perhaps something…

Convert Text to Number

By Jeff Lenning | May 28, 2024 |

Have you ever been baffled by Excel’s handling of numbers? Are you tired of grappling with non-cooperative imported data that insists on being treated as text rather than numbers? We can relate to that, and we’re here to walk through this process with you. Video Step-by-step Let’s unravel the mystery of converting text to numbers…

Update Subsequent (but not previous) Worksheets

By Jeff Lenning | May 21, 2024 |

Whether you’re managing a budget for various departments or tracking volunteers throughout the year, using multiple worksheets in a workbook is very common. I was recently asked a question about how to get a change made in one sheet to flow to subsequent sheets, but not to previous sheets. In this post, I provide a…

Dynamic Conditional Formatting for Top 3 Values

By Jeff Lenning | May 14, 2024 |

I recently received a question: “Can I format a cell based on another cell value, and have the formatting update automatically whenever the cell value changes?” Then answer is “yes” and this blog post demonstrates the steps. To illustrate the steps, we’ll dynamically highlight the top three scores in a list … and as the…

Excel Tips from 19 Experts

By Jeff Lenning | April 23, 2024 |

My friend John Michaloudis does an annual survey of Excel MVPs and experts and asks for their best Excel tip. He compiles the tips into an audio podcast along with show notes and related links. This is a great resource and I love sharing it every year. This year, he rounded up tips from: You’ll…

Creating a 4-4-5 Financial Calendar

By Jeff Lenning | April 16, 2024 |

We all love Excel, don’t we? But it’s just not that simple when it comes to creating a 4-4-5 Financial Calendar! Got questions about how it’s done? You’re not alone! Today, we will walk you through the creation of a 4-4-5 (4 weeks, 4 weeks, and 5 weeks) calendar in Excel. By the end of…