How to FIX SPILL Error in Excel - WHY it's NOT ALWAYS Obvious!

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Today, we're going to cover a common question I get which is what is the #SPILL! error and how can I get rid of it? Well, sometimes it's easy to find a reason for it but sometimes it's not so obvious. Let me show you here. (upbeat music) Here, for example, I have a list of names and salaries. And if I write this formula, so I just say equals, and I highlight the salary column and I press Enter, I get the #SPILL! error. This is an error that you're going to see only in the Excel 365 version. And the reason for it is that formula's now spill. So take a look at this. When I go on the cell we can see this light blue border around it. The formula wants to put results onto each single cell. It can't because there's a blockage. To get rid of it, in this case, all I have to do is remove this text. And when I do everything spills correctly. Okay, so you are also going to see this if you, for example, go here and you say equals and you highlight the whole column and then you press Enter, it's not going to work because you're putting the entire column starting from here. It will work if I pull this all the way up here and then everything spills. But it's not good practice to reference entire columns. So I'm going to get rid of that. Now you're also going to see this. If you use functions like unique or sort or filter. So these are the new functions that were introduced with 365. So if I get a unique of this and I have no blockage, it's no problem, right? Formula spilled. Now in case there is a blockage, so I have some texts here and I press Enter, I get that error again. I need to get rid of it for it to spill. Some other times it might not be so obvious why you have this. So let's say you have a workbook and then you go and do the same thing here and then your press Enter. And we get the #SPILL! error. And look at this, there is no blockage. What's happening? Well, the reason for this is that there is something in there, but you just can't see it. Either because maybe the font is white. Like take a look at this. This is, who's Gary? The font is white. If I change it to black, I can see that. Now, when I take it away, it's still not working. I have something else in there. And it's, who is Peter? But in this case, it's not the font. That's not the problem. It was formatted to disappear. So if I right-mouse click and go to Format Cells it was given this formatting, which is actually hiding the content of the cells. If I take away the formatting, I can see who's Peter here, go with, OK, and then remove the blockage. Everything spills. Okay, so sometimes it's obvious. Sometimes it's not so obvious, but the reason is that your formula can't go all the way to the bottom of where it wants to go, because there is a blockage. Okay, so that's a short video on the #SPILL! error. I hope you enjoyed this. If you did do give it a thumbs up. And if you aren't subscribed to this channel and you want to get better in Excel and other office products, consider subscribing. (upbeat music)
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Channel: Leila Gharani
Views: 185,630
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Keywords: XelplusVis, Leila Gharani, Advanced Excel tricks, Excel online course, Excel tips and tricks, Excel for analysts, Microsoft Excel tutorials, Microsoft Excel, XelPlus, Microsoft 365, Excel 365, excel error, excel function error, excel formula error, how to correct excel formula error, excel hash spill error, hash spill, #spill, spill error
Id: aGxXKyzGV_g
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Length: 3min 38sec (218 seconds)
Published: Thu Jan 14 2021
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