Final answer:
To perform a VLOOKUP across multiple sheets, use the VLOOKUP function in combination with INDIRECT function to dynamically reference different sheets and iterate over them to find the desired value. You may use IFERROR to move to the next sheet if the value is not found.
Step-by-step explanation:
To perform a VLOOKUP across multiple sheets in Excel, you can use the VLOOKUP function in combination with the INDIRECT function. Here's a basic overview of the steps you'll need to follow:
- Create a list of sheet names that you want to search in.
- Use the INDIRECT function to reference these sheets dynamically within your VLOOKUP formula.
- Write a VLOOKUP formula that iterates over the list of sheet names until it finds the desired value.
Here is an example of what the formula might look like:
=VLOOKUP(value, INDIRECT(sheet_name&"!range"), column_index, FALSE)
Where value is what you're looking for, sheet_name is a reference to the sheet name, range is the range where the data is held, and column_index is the number of the column in the range that has the value you want to return.
If you have multiple sheets to look through, you may need to use a combination of VLOOKUP and IFERROR functions to move to the next sheet if the value is not found on the current one:
=IFERROR(VLOOKUP(value, INDIRECT(sheet1&"!range"), column_index, FALSE), VLOOKUP(value, INDIRECT(sheet2&"!range"), column_index, FALSE))
This formula checks the first sheet for the value, and if it's not found, it proceeds to check the next sheet, and so on.