Comments on: Excel formulas not working, not updating, not calculating: fixes & solutions

This tutorial explains the most common mistakes when making formulas in Excel, and how to fix a formula that is not calculating or not updating automatically. Continue reading →

Comments page 5. Total comments: 459

  1. I have a active-X control button which runs a routine to change values of cells in my spreadsheet. I had a problem with this not working correctly (my programming error) and my code broke in the middle. I had set auto-calculate off and back on again using the statements below at varying points in my code to make it run faster. Now the auto-calculate does not work. I tried turning it back on with the Toolbar at the top and also using the Formula tab in File-Options. Neither one worked. There are big holes in my spreadsheet which do not update now and I can't seem to fix it. Even forcing calculations with the Toolbar option or by just using F9 or even Shift-F9 will not work. I saved my file and re-opened it but nothing changed. Is this a known issue with Excel?

    Application.Calculation = xlCalculationManual
    Application.ScreenUpdating = False

    Application.Calculation = xlCalculationManual
    Application.ScreenUpdating = True

  2. Thank you so much! :)

  3. I have been using the =getformula for a while all out of the blue it stop working i get the message #Name?

    Before I used to just type =get it would pop up.

    Regards
    Chris

    1. Hello!
      I'm assuming =getformula is a custom function. The workbook or add-in in which it is written must be open. Only then will it work.

  4. Thanks! Very helpful!

  5. Thank you very much! After two days struggling with formulas, I finally found the solution at your post!

  6. Thank you so much! You just saved my day. Couldn't resist to drop a comment for thanking you.

  7. I came here looking for an answer to the issue of the fact that I just noticed that my Excel spreadsheet is not automatically updating my totals and is maintaining old data in cells after I have changed the data. I have noticed that if I go to the print screen and then back my total is now correct. My formula is really simple =Sum(J18:J19)

    The fix recommendation of making sure my Formulas, Options, setting is set for "Calculate Automatically" has been tried...no different result. Our IT department has even went the extra step and uninstalled my Excel and reinstalled but still the same issue.

    Does anyone have any other ideas on what is wrong and a fix?

    1. I had this issue as well. I'm not sure why this worked, but I protected the sheet, then unprotected it again. Now all of the formulas are automatically calculating again.

  8. i want to calculate birthday year and formula it s doesen't working

    =datedif(B2,Today(),"Y")

  9. I have a problem with the formula working in one cell, but not in another cell which is set to draw it's data from that cell.

    So in one workbook, I have a cell with the formula =Trades!C156+'Property Services'!C128+Housing!C136+Resources!C111+Development!C26+'People, Comms, Community & Exec'!C61 This calculates a total of 165. Sometimes. Sometimes it says 0 - until I force a recalculation like suggested above.

    I have a dashboard in another workbook which is supposed to pull through the number from that cell (using ='[H&S Matrix May 21.xlsx]Dashboard'!$C$3), and it used to no problem, but now consistently pulls through a result of 0, no matter if I ask one or both workbooks to recaclulate.

    What's going on?

    1. Hi!
      Unfortunately, without seeing your data it is difficult to give you any advice. All books must be open for external links to work. Check out the way to work with them in Data> Queries & Connections> Edit Links.
      You can learn more about external links in Excel in this article on our blog.

  10. Thank you working fine !

  11. before I have excel 2008 installed now I installed 2010 excel but I face a problem when I copy the formula it is not past on the down cell. just working CTRL-D COMMAND please solve this problem
    Thanks

  12. Thank you for your help, you saved my time that make me free from trouble.

  13. Beautiful effort, I appreciate whole team best of luck.

  14. Hi,

    I have 12 sheet in a workbook, I want to 10 sheets to calculate one time (manual) per day and other 2 sheets to calculate automatic.

    if all 12 sheet calculation automatic, it will be taking time

    1. Hi,
      The calculation order is set in Excel options and applies to all workbooks and worksheets without exception.

  15. Hello I am using a SUMIFS formula to check 3 or 4 conditions from a table. All works fine until the SUMIFS formula references cells in rows 100 and beyond - and then it breaks (returns 0 for all sums).

    I have checked cell formats, formula content etc and everything is the same for row 100 as it is for the rows above. I must be missing something in the way that I'm addressing rows in my formula?

  16. Thanks. Was very helpful for me. Wish you all the best.

  17. I have simple sum formulas on 3 spreadsheets. I created a 4th document (recon) to compare the totals pages to the prior 3 spreadsheets. If I open the recon spreadsheet in one window, and the other 3 spreadsheets in another window, the formulas don't automatically update. They will only update if I have all spreadsheets open in the same window. Is there a workaround or is this just how it needs to be?

    1. Hello!
      Unfortunately I was unable to reproduce your problem. A separate window is always opened for each file. If a file is opened in Excel, then the data from it is always updated in another file.

  18. Hello, i have an excel document and in some cells, like this: =FRONTPAGE!B15. From the beginning all was ok, instead formula, the corresponding text from sheet FRONTPAGE, cell B5 was displayed. But now if I double click on that cell containing formula, the corresponding text is replaced by formula.
    Calculation option is set to Automatic.

  19. Hi, I'm trying to collate attendance to meetings that are being run each day. My colleagues are generating a 'Register' spreadsheet from a meeting attendance download in TEAMS. It just gives three columns of Name, Action, Date/time stamp. This is changed from a CSV to Excel Workbook.
    My 'Attendance' Excel work book has the following formulae:
    =IF(IFERROR((COUNTIFS('filestructure\[2021-01-11 P2 Po Hs.xlsx]meetingAttendanceList (2)'!$A:$A,A105,'filestructure\[2021-01-11 P2 Po Hs.xlsx]meetingAttendanceList (2)'!$B:$B,"Joined")),0)>=1,1,0)
    If I open the 'Register' my 'Attendance' calculations work but, if the 'Regsiter' is closed I just get 0 for attendance when it should be 1
    I have to link into a lot of different 'Registers' for each day and am currently opening all the registers in order to get some figures into my 'Attendance' spreadsheet. What have I done wrong???
    I've got the 'Attendance' and 'Register' spreadsheets in the same folder on our network. It's a lengthy location so I've reduced it to "filestructure" for your sanity. The fact that it calculates it when I open the register tells me it can find it. Very confused - HELP!!!

    1. Hello!
      If I understand your task correctly, your formula uses data from a separate file. She can get this data only when this file is open in Excel. If the file is not open in Excel, then the data from it cannot be used in formulas.

      1. That's right.

  20. Hi! I have problem with the auto calculation issue. I use an MS Form what send data to a OneDrive shared excel file. This is works fine. I use some more analysis and calculation from the received data. And here is the problem , since the data is not calculated even with F9 recalculate function. However if I'm open the cell function and enter on, than the calculation is working. It is not the way to make manual open-enter on all cell, so I really looking after where is the bug.
    Really I don't understand the issue with this shared xls and struggling with solution!
    Many thanks for suggestions!

  21. Thank you for your suggestion to check the List separator (Suggestion#7).
    I have been using vlook every day for nearly 2 years but recently my excell was updated and my Vlookup wasn't working and I was going crazy and finally realized the list separator is not comma but | in the new version
    Thank you.

  22. I am using MS Office and Excel for Mac; do the above fixes differ when trying to get Excel to calculate formulas? I came here looking for an answer to the issue of the fact that I just noticed that my Excel spreadsheet in not automatically updating and maintaining old data in cells after I have changed the data.

    My only option right now is to re-calculate every cell and every calculation. but then when I make a change I'll have to watch changes are made again.

    The fix recommendation of making sure my Formulas, Options, setting is set for "Calculate Automatically" has been tried...no different result.

    Does anyone have any other ideas on what is wrong and a fix?

  23. I'm having the same issue as Abby - I can't get a simple AutoSum formula to work - it just shows a zero. I've tried both ways (=B21+B40) and =(SUM(B1, B40). And when I click on prior AutoSum formulas that worked perfectly, they reset to zero.

    1. Having the sane "autosum not adding anything up and only giving zero as result" problem here, Used to work in previous versions. No idea why now not working

  24. Hi, my problem is I just Sumif formula for using one file to another file, if both files are open that formula give a correct ans. but i closed that Conciliated file that formula shows #value!. Please advise.

  25. Formula for a cell is not calculating, it just shows as zero. I'm using accounting format, but I have attempted to switch to general and it still doesn't calculate. It is an extremely basic formula - =B14+F14. I sent the email to a coworker and she is having the same issue.

  26. Would a formula not work due to an enabled editing from a protected document? the person who sent me the excel document via email can edit the worksheet and use the formula function after enable editing. although when i open the same document from the email, I do not get the "enable editing" yellow bar and the document's formulas do not work. Please help?

  27. Hallo,
    Could you help me with this formula, please?
    =IF(AND(F14=12),"Continue",IF(AND(F147),"Continue",IF(AND(F14>70,F22>=12),"Rethink","Cancel")))
    In place where supposed to appear "Rethink" stubbornly apeears "Continue". I tried many different options but even when I delete everything and left only two parts and "Cancel" as false statement , it showed me "Continue"
    There are 5 columns for this formula. Four are working good. All changes in figures cause changes in results - the text. The last column resists.This part : IF(AND(F14>70,F22>=12),"Rethink" is designed exactly for this column to met all condition. I tried everything I know and it is not working. Could you help me with this - why it is happening? I checked settings in my excel and everything is ok

    1. Hello!
      Your formula is incomplete. Try to insert spaces before and after the > and <. Then it will be recorded in full.

      1. Hallo, Thank you for response, Btw I just noticed I made the mistake when I was copying my formula to show you, here is right one =IF(AND(F1412),"Continue",IF(AND(F147),"Continue",IF(AND(F14>70,F22>12),"Rethink","Cancel"))), I added spaces as you advised and got info that typo was found and excel corrected it back with no space :( still not working

        1. Hello!
          Unfortunately, I cannot figure out your formula. I forgot to say that spaces should not be inserted in Excel, but in the comment itself. If possible, describe in words the conditions in the formula to make it easier for me to understand how it works. Thank you.

  28. Thanks so much!! I was on the verge of giving up and found an easy solution here.

  29. Hi,
    I have an own function, eg :

    Function Pipo( nRow as integer, nColumn as Integer, nVal as Integer )
    Cells( nRow, nColumn+1).Value = nVal+1
    Pipo = nVal
    End Function

    -> Update next Cell with value : nVal+1
    -> Returns : nVal

    The cell it is used in in looks like : =Pipo( ROW(), COLUMN(), 9 )

    However the return in "#VALUE" and the next cell is not updated.
    It is the Cells function that is causing this error. Even using Range() instead does not work.

    Any ideas?

    G,
    Marco

    1. Well, found it -> updating a cell only works from within a Subroutine.

      Case closed.

  30. was using excell all was ok now suddenly any new formula eg sum of 2 cells or sum of row, and all gives a $ - result. how can i fix this?

  31. I am trying to add a simple column of numbers and sum it up in a separate cell - like I've done for 20 years. I am typing : =SUM(highlighting the cells).... It simply does not add up the result, just showing 0! Ditto any other function like AVERAGE.I followed your tips to no avail. I am using licensed 365 Excel subs. (Also how may I simply clear all formatting from all cells? My cells are all General.

  32. some fields recalculate when I change a variable, some don't. When I try to fix a field individually by re-inputting the formula the value goes to 0.

    I looked into the fixes listed here with no luck.

  33. Hi, I'm trying to produce a Gantt chart and have been following some online tutorials (Vertex42)

    Having carefully followed the instructions it appears l am unable to fill the bars - all relevant information is inputted - weekly dates, start dates, and finished dates as like the tutorial.
    However when l select conditional formatting, new rule and input the new formula - AND(E$5>=$B7,E$5<=$C7), followed by pressing format which then gives the option to select fill colour, on selection of fill colour it returns to format options - where l select "OK" and then nothing changes, unlike the tutorial where all relevant information bars highlighted in the chosen colour

  34. Found the solution to my problems. Thanks

  35. ITS REALLY HELPFULL THANKS FOR THIS.

  36. thank you it helps.

  37. Thanks a lot

  38. In my spreadsheet, there are a couple of random cells where the formula does not produce the correct result. It's a simple if statement.

    1. Hello!
      And what is your problem?
      Please specify what you were trying to find, what formula you used and what problem or error occurred.

  39. I'm trying to find the reason that certain cells do not generate an outcome when my colleague opens the sheet, whereas with me and other colleagues it does. His setting is set at automatic, so that's not it. We've also restarted excel. It's a string of cells that return a value by looking it up in a database. (e.g. array functions and vlookup involved)
    Does anyone have any suggestions where to look?

    1. Hello!
      You haven't written what kind of data you're working with. Perhaps you have differences in the regional settings, in the separators used. If you give more information, I will try to help.

      1. Has this been resolved? I am having the same issue. Formula is countifs

  40. I am trying to use IF function to determine if numbers in two cells are the same. I think the issue is one of the cells in the comparison is from a calculation. i.e. Cell A ($0.14) is a hard number typed in, Cell D is calculated from numbers in cell B and Cell C (B-$31.21*0.45%).
    The IF function will only work if I switch the "if true" and "if false" - that is completely backwards and doesn't make sense to do. Any guidance is appreciated.

      1. You just saved my sanity with that answer :-)

  41. Thanks a lot. It is Really very helpful. My issue was resolved within some seconds.

  42. ablebits was the FIRST source to help me figure out why my formulas weren't calculating on an excel summary speadsheet. Microsoft, among others, assumes that every idiot is a genius even before he or she ventures into a new area of excel (or any other microsoft product, for that matter). In this case, I never before summed values from multiple worksheets. That may be hard to believe but it's true. How was I supposed to know that the "show formulas" option was "on" or even that it would prevent me from calculating formulas? If I were Bill Gates, I wouldn't be sitting here, right? Why do he and his fellow robots just ASSUME that we are all blinding beams of light like all Harvard and MIT students are? Thank you ablebits!!! I'm under quite a bit of pressure, and I will remember this--and you!

  43. thank you very much. this article help me.

  44. I just wanted to say thank you, this was very helpful. I contacted Microsoft and my company IT department for something that started after my system was updated from 2010 to 2016. After 4 phones call and 5 people that told me it was a compatibility issue and I had to recreate all my formulated spreadsheets, I almost lost my mind. I knew there had to be a solution to the issue I was having. After finding this page, 2 clicks later my problem was solved. This goes to show that just because someone works for a company doesn't always mean that they have the answers or even know what they are talking about. They almost had me unnecessarily recreating numerous spreadsheets because they could not be bothered to listen to the issue. I think the worst thing about customer service in 2020 is people would rather give you wrong/misinformation than to admit they don’t know how to do something.

  45. In my current position, I have to examine data in spreadsheets.
    One of the most current problems I have is WHEN I insert column to grab a DAY (for example), it comes back MM/DD/YYYY instead of DD. I have to format that column to GENERAL to just get DD

    1. Unfortunately, Excel always copies the format to a new column or row from neighboring ones. This can only be changed using the VBA macro.

      Excel includes a feature that allows you to modify how you insert rows, columns, or cells in your worksheet. When you insert any of these, Excel displays a small, floating "button" right near the inserted row, column, or cell. The button, called "Insert Options," has a small paintbrush on it, similar to the Format Painter tool. Click the button, and Excel displays some options about how the inserted row, column, or cell should be formatted.

  46. The RIGHT() command is not responding inside IF()
    For example,
    =IF(RIGHT(A2,1)<4,A2+$F$14,A2+$F$15)

    In both conditions the results are fulse(second one).
    Please help me thanks ?

    1. Hello!
      For your formula to work, numbers must be written in all the cells it uses. Give an example of the source data and the expected result.
      It’ll help me understand it better and find a solution for you. Thank you.

  47. Nice Article, it resolved my issues

  48. Hi,
    Can you please help.
    Here's my scenario.
    I have a value in cell C1 let's say 5 , this cell value is an output of this formula =TEXTJOIN("",TRUE,IFERROR(MID(A1,ROW(INDIRECT("1:30")),1)+0,"")) because I want to get the numeric value only from the other cell. And now in cell D1 I have a value let's say 3 this is an extracted value from previous result. So now in cell E1, I want to match cell C1 and cell D1 if they match or not, so I used this formula =IF(C1=D1,"Match","Not Match"). My problem was it did not get the correct evaluation, all results are "Not Match" even there are values that are Matched. I tried the remedies mentioned but still didn't worked. Thank you.

    1. Hello!
      In your example, you compare 5 and 3. And they do not match. You did not specify real values. I can assume that you are comparing text and number. Perhaps there are extra spaces, non-printable characters in the text. I recommend checking for extra spaces and non-printing characters, as described in this article.

  49. Wowww....

  50. 1. Go to formulas tab, and uncheck the button "Show Formulas". It will show the result in cell instead of formulas. 2. Change the cell format into General -> double click on that cell and enter again (rewrite the formulas)

    1. OMG! Just this trick would work. Thank you!

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