While using Microsoft Excel, you may encounter a few common Excel errors while creating or working with formulas. It's important to identify and learn how to correct these errors, otherwise, you may risk the chance of unintended results being displayed on your spreadsheet.
1. ###### error
Problem: The column is not wide enough to display all the characters in a cell.
Solution: Extend the width of the column.
2. # Div/0! error
Problem: This error is displayed when a number is divided either by zero (0) or an empty cell.
Solution: Change the divider to a value that is not equal to 0.
3. #Name? error
Problem: The text in a formula is not recognized by Excel. This is caused by misspelling the function names. For instance =su(A1:A7) will result in the #Name? error.
Solution: Correct the error by entering =sum(A1:A7).
4. #Value! error
Problem: This error will be displayed if the formula includes cells that contain different data types. = B1(85) + B2(75) + B3(data) will result in the #Value! error message.
Solution: Replace B3(data) with a numeric value and the error will be corrected.
5. #REF! error
Problem: This error will be displayed when a cell reference is not valid. Deleting cells that were referred by other formulas will cause this error.
Solution: Refer the cells to the correct ranges and the error will be corrected.
6. #NUM! error
Problem: The formula or function contains invalid numeric values.
Solution: Using $, % symbols with the number can result in this error, so avoid using these.
7. #NULL error
Problem: Excel displays this error when you specify an intersection of two areas that do not intersect (cross). The intersection operator is a space character that separates references in a formula. =Sum(A1:A2 C3:C5) returns the #NULL error because the two ranges do not intersect.
Solution: =SUM(A1:F1 B1:B10) will return the correct reference.
*Note: These common errors apply to Microsoft Excel 2010, 2013, and 2016.
You can download the Excel formula quick-fix cheat sheet, to have a copy for yourself and make these common formula errors a thing of the past.