How to Find Duplicates in Excel
When working with a Microsoft Excel spreadsheet with lots of data, you'll probably encounter duplicate entries. Microsoft Excel's Conditional Formatting feature shows you exactly where duplicates are, while the Remove Duplicates feature...
Method 1 of 2:
Using Conditional Formatting
- Open your original file. The first thing you'll need to do is select all data you wish to examine for duplicates.
- Click the cell in the upper left-hand corner of your data group. This begins the selecting process.
- Hold down the ⇧ Shift key and click the final cell. Note that the final cell should be in the lower right-hand corner of your data group. This will select all of your data.
- You can do this in any order (e.g., click the lower right-hand box first, then highlight from there).
- Click on "Conditional Formatting." It can be found in the "Home" tab/ribbon of the toolbar (in many cases, under the "Styles" section).[1] Clicking it will prompt a drop-down menu.
- Select "Highlight Cells Rules," then "Duplicate Values." Make sure your data is still highlighted when you do this. This will open a window with customization options in another drop-down menu.[2]
- Select "Duplicate Values" from the drop-down menu.
- If you instead wish to display all unique values, you can select "Unique" instead.
- Choose your highlight color. The highlight color will designate duplicates. The default is light red with dark red text.[3]
- Click "OK" to view your results.
- Select a duplicate's box and press Delete to delete it. You won't want to delete these values if each piece of data represents something (e.g., a survey).
- Once you delete a one-time duplicate, its partner value will lose its highlight.
- Click on "Conditional Formatting" again. Whether you deleted your duplicates or not, you should remove the highlight formatting before exiting the document.
- Select "Clear Rules," then "Clear Rules from Entire Sheet" to clear formatting. This will remove the highlighting around any duplicates you didn't delete.[4]
- If you have multiple sections of your spreadsheet formatted, you can select a specific area and click "Clear Rules from Selected Cells" to remove their highlighting.
- Save your document's changes. If you're satisfied with your revisions, you have successfully found and deleted duplicates in Excel!
Method 2 of 2:
Using Excel's Remove Duplicates Feature
- Open your original file. The first thing you'll need to do is select all data you wish to examine for duplicates.
- Click the cell in the upper left-hand corner of your data group. This begins the selecting process.
- Hold down the ⇧ Shift key and click the final cell. The final cell is in the lower right-hand corner of your data group. This will select all of your data.
- You can do this in any order (e.g., click the lower right-hand box first, then highlight from there).
- Click on the "Data" tab in the top section of the screen.
- Find the "Data Tools" section of the toolbar. This section includes tools to manipulate your selected data, including the "Remove Duplicates" feature.
- Click "Remove Duplicates." This will bring up a customization window.
- Click "Select All." This will verify all of your columns have been selected.[5]
- Check any columns you wish to use this tool on. The default setting has all columns checked.
- Click the "My data has headers" option, if applicable. This will prompt the program to label the first entry in each column as a header, leaving them out of the deletion process.
- Click "OK" to remove duplicates. When you are satisfied with your options, click "OK". This will automatically remove any duplicate values from your selection.
- If the program tells you that there aren't any duplicates--especially if you know there are--try placing a check next to individual columns in the "Remove Duplicates" window. Scanning each column one at a time will resolve any errors here.
- Save your document's changes. If you're satisfied with your revisions, you have successfully deleted duplicates in Excel!
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