Excel: VLOOKUP Basics for Business Users

VLOOKUP is one of the most useful Excel functions for business — it lets you look up a value in one table and pull related data from another. Here's a plain-English guide. What VLOOKUP does: It searches for a value in the first column of a range, then returns a value from a column you specify in the same row. Basic VLOOKUP syntax: =VLOOKUP(what to find, where to look, which column to return, exact or approximate match) Example: You have a customer list with customer IDs in column A and names in column B. In another sheet, you want to look up a customer ID and get their name. =VLOOKUP(A2, CustomerList!A:B, 2, FALSE) Breaking it down: - A2 = the customer ID you're looking up - CustomerList!A:B = the range containing the data (on the CustomerList sheet) - 2 = return the value from the 2nd column (names) - FALSE = exact match (use FALSE for most business lookups) Common VLOOKUP problems: 1. Returns #N/A — the value wasn't found. Check spelling, leading/trailing spaces (use TRIM()), and that you're looking in the right column. 2. Returns wrong value — make sure the last argument is FALSE for exact match, not TRUE (approximate match). 3. Can't look left — VLOOKUP can only return columns to the right of the lookup column. If you need to look left, use XLOOKUP (available in Microsoft 365). XLOOKUP (the modern replacement): =XLOOKUP(A2, CustomerList!A:A, CustomerList!B:B) This is simpler, more flexible, and can look in any direction. If you have Microsoft 365, use XLOOKUP instead. Tip: Lock your lookup range with $ signs so it doesn't shift when you copy the formula down: =VLOOKUP(A2, $CustomerList.$A:$B, 2, FALSE) Press F4 after selecting the range to add the $ signs automatically.