VLook UP

Hello Susan

Thank you for your question.

The 'false' part of the vlookup function tells Excel that there needs to be an exact match to the lookup value (first part of the vlookup function), otherwise you will get an N/A result.

For example, if I am using the number 5 as my lookup value, and there is no number 5 in the leftmost column of my table array (second part of the function), then Excel displays N/A as my lookup value doesn't exist.

If I remove the 'false' from the function, then you are telling Excel that it only needs to find an approximate match to my lookup value (i.e. 'near enough is good enough').

Using the previous example, if I removed the 'false' and Excel found the number 4 in the leftmost column of the table array, it would then pull out the corresponding piece of data from the same row that the number 4 appears in.

I hope this helps to explain what is happening. Let me know if you have any further questions.

Amanda