In this presentation author and Excel expert David H. Ringstrom, CPA, demystifies Excel’s family of lookup functions, guiding you from the legacy VLOOKUP formula to the more versatile XLOOKUP. David shows how to build lookup formulas from the ground up, using Excel’s built-in help tools to enter lookup values, select arrays, and troubleshoot common issues such as #REF! and #N/A errors. He contrasts approximate and exact match behavior, explains how to eliminate errors caused by extra spaces or AutoCorrect quirks, and demonstrates how to handle missing matches gracefully using IFNA. Along the way, you'll explore best practices such as future-proofing lookup formulas, using tables for structured referencing, and pairing INDEX with MATCH to enhance flexibility. Whether you’re stuck on VLOOKUP or ready to dive into XLOOKUP, this session will deepen your understanding and improve your lookup reliability.
David is the author of “Microsoft Excel 365 for Dummies”, “Exploring Microsoft Excel’s Hidden Treasures”, and has written or co-authored six other books. He demonstrates every technique at least twice: first, on a PowerPoint slide with numbered steps, and second, in the subscription-based Excel for Microsoft 365. David draws your attention to any differences in Excel 2021, 2019 or 2016 during the presentation and in his detailed handouts. The handouts include an Excel workbook with most of the examples he uses during his demonstrations.
Excel for Microsoft 365 is a subscription-based product that receives periodic feature updates. Conversely, perpetually licensed versions have year numbers in their names and do not receive any feature updates.
This webinar is available with
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$29.00!
| Instructor: | David Ringstrom |
| Course No: | COMP-LOOKUP-G34125 |
| Recommended CPE: | 2.00 |
| Delivery Method: | Group Live - Seminar |
| Date Offered: | 7/21/2026 10:00 AM - 12:00 PM |
| Level of Knowledge: | Basic |
| Prerequisites: | None |
| Advanced Preparation: | None |
| Registration Requirements: | No registration is required |
| Recommended Field of Study: | Computer Software and Applications
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Learning Objectives
- State which XLOOKUP argument causes an alternate value to be displayed in lieu of #N/A.
- State the arguments for Excel's SUMIF function.
- Recall what to specify in the match_mode argument to cause XLOOKUP to return an approximate match based upon the next smaller item.