When you work in large spreadsheets, it’s often useful to search for certain text, values, or characters. Needless to say, this is a tedious process to do manually. Fortunately, Excel has built-in search features that you can use to quickly find the information you need. Let’s learn how to search in Microsoft Excel.
How to Search in Excel (With Key Commands)
There are two quick ways to perform searches in Excel. The easiest and simplest helps you find values by inputting a simple key command on Windows or Mac.
Consider a spreadsheet full of data. You want to quickly find the name “John” contained in the workbook. To do it, press Cmd + F on your keyboard. (On Windows, use Ctrl + F on your keyboard).
Excel will open the Search Sheet box in the upper right corner of the menu. Click and then type in your search value. In this example, that’s John. Hit Enter, and you’ll see the first cell containing the value is now selected in your worksheet.
To find other usages of your search term, you have two options. You can hit Enter on your keyboard again, and Excel will continue moving through the results of your search. Or, you can use the arrows in the Search Sheet box to move both forward and backward through your data.
How to Search in Excel (On the Home Tab)
The second easy search feature in Excel lives on the Home tab on the ribbon. It’s more robust and gives you better flexibility as you search.
On the Home tab, find the Find & Select dropdown on the right side.
Clicking on Find launches a menu box with several options. It gives you more search control, and allows you to search a full workbook.
You can search within rows, and specify exact or partial case matches. Make your selections, and click Find Next in the lower right corner. Excel will repeat your search, operating within the outlined parameters.
As you can see, it’s easy to search in Microsoft Excel. This makes it a breeze to find values in even the largest and most complex workbooks.
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