How To Find Double Items In Excel

[Minette Mccandrew]

Thetutorial explains how to search for duplicates in Excel. You will learn a few formulas to identify duplicate values or find duplicate rows with or without first occurrences. You will also learn how to count instances of each duplicate record individually and find the total number of dupes in a column, how to filter out duplicates, and more.

While working with a large Excel worksheet or consolidating several small spreadsheets into a bigger one, you may find lots of duplicate rows in it. In one of our previous tutorials, we discussed various ways to compare two tables or columns for duplicates.

The easiest way to detect duplicates in Excel is using the COUNTIF function. Depending on whether you want to find duplicate values with or without first occurrences, there's going to be a slight variation in the formula as shown in the following examples.

The formula will return "Duplicates" for duplicate records, and a blank cell for unique records:

How to search for duplicates in Excel without 1st occurrencesIn case you plan to filter or remove duplicates after finding them, using the above formula is not safe because it marks all identical records as duplicates. And if you want to keep the unique values in your list, then you cannot delete all duplicate records, you need to only delete the 2nd and all subsequent instances.

As you can see in the following screenshot, this formula does not identity the first occurrence of "Apples" as duplicate:

How to find case-sensitive duplicates in ExcelIn situations when you need to identify exact duplicates including the text case, use this generic array formula (entered by pressing Ctrl + Shift + Enter):

At the heart of the formula, you use the EXACT function to compare the target cell with each cell in the specified range exactly. The result of this operation is an array of TRUE (match) and FALSE (not match), which is coerced to an array of 1's and 0's by the unary operator (--). After that, the SUM function adds up the numbers, and if the sum is greater than 1, the IF function reports a "Duplicate".

If your aim is to dedupe a table consisting of several columns, then you need a formula that can check each column and identify only absolute duplicate rows, i.e. rows that have completely equal values in all columns.

Let's consider the following example. Supposing, you have order numbers in column A, dates in column B, and ordered items in column C, and you want to find duplicate rows with the same order number, date and item. For this, we are going to create a duplicate formula based on the COUNTIFS function that allows checking multiple criteria at a time:

The following screenshot demonstrates that the formula really locates only the rows that have identical values in all 3 columns. For example, row 8 has the same order number and date as rows 2 and 5, but a different item in column C, and therefore it is not marked as duplicate row:

Once the duplicate values are counted, you can hide unique values and only view duplicates, or vice versa. To do this, apply Excel's auto-filter as demonstrated in the following example: How to filter out duplicates in Excel.

Count the total number of duplicates in a column(s)The easiest way to count duplicates in a column is to employ any of the formulas we used to identify duplicates in Excel (with or without first occurrences). And then you can count duplicate values by using the following COUNTIF formula:

To find the total number of duplicate rows, embed the COUNTIFS function instead of COUNTIF in the above formula, and specify all of the columns you want to check for duplicates. For example, to count duplicate rows based on columns A and B, enter the following formula in your Excel sheet:

How to filter duplicates in ExcelFor easier data analysis, you may want to filter your data to only display duplicates. In other situations, you may need the opposite - hide duplicates and view unique records. Below you will find solutions for both scenarios.

If you want to see all duplicates at a glance, use one of the formulas to find duplicates in Excel that better suits your needs. Then select your table, switch to the Data tab, and click the Filter button. Alternatively, you can click Sort & Filter > Filter on the Home tab in the Editing group.

After that, click the arrow in the header of the Duplicate column and check the "Duplicate row" box to show duplicates. If you want to filter out, i.e. hide duplicates, select "Unique" to view only unique records:

And now, you can sort duplicates by the key column to group them for easier analysis. In this example, we can sort duplicate rows by the Order number column:

How to filter duplicates by their occurrencesIf you want to show 2nd, 3rd, or Nth occurrences of duplicate values, use the formula to count duplicate instances we discussed earlier:

To display all duplicate records, i.e. occurrences greater than 1, click the filter arrow in the header of the Occurrences column (the column with the formula), and then click Number Filters > Greater Than.

In a similar manner, you can show 2nd, 3rd and all subsequent duplicate occurrences. Just type the required number in the box next to "is greater than".

Highlight, select, clear, delete, copy or move duplicatesAfter you've filtered duplicates like demonstrated above, you have a variety of choices to deal with them.

Tip. In most cases, the above shortcuts work fine and select filtered (visible) rows only. In some rare cases, mostly on very large workbooks, both visible and invisible cells may get selected. To fix this, use one of the above shortcuts first, and then press Alt + ; to select only visible cells, ignoring hidden rows.

To clear duplicates in Excel, select them, right click, and then click Clear Contents (or click the Clear button > Clear Contents on the Home tab, in the Editing group). This will delete the cell contents only, and you will have empty cells as the result. Selecting the filtered duplicate cells and pressing the Delete key will have the same effect.

To remove entire duplicate rows, filter duplicates, select the rows by dragging the mouse across the row headings, right click the selection, and then choose Delete Row from the context menu.

How to highlight duplicates in ExcelTo highlight duplicate values, select the filtered dupes, click the Fill color button on the Home tab, in the Font group, and then select the color of your choosing.

Another way to highlight duplicates in Excel is using a built-in conditional formatting rule for duplicates, or creating a custom rule specially tailored for your sheet. Experienced Excel users won't have any problem with creating such a rule based on the formulas we used to check duplicates in Excel. If you are not very comfortable with Excel formulas or rules yet, you will find the detailed steps in this tutorial: How to highlight duplicates in Excel.

To move duplicates to another sheet, perform the same steps with the only difference that you press Ctrl + X (cut) instead of Ctrl + C (copy).

Duplicate Remover - fast and efficient way to locate duplicates in ExcelNow that you know how to use duplicate formulas in Excel, let me demonstrate you another quick, efficient and formula-free way - Duplicate Remover for Excel.

This all-in-one tool can search for duplicate or unique values in a single column or compare two columns. It can find, select and highlight duplicate records or entire duplicate rows, remove found dupes, copy or move them to another sheet. I think an example of practical use is worth many words, so let's get to it.

As you see, the table has a few columns. The first 3 columns contain the most relevant information, so we are going to search for duplicate rows based solely on the data in columns A - C. To find duplicate records in these columns, just do the following:

Click the OK button and wait for a few seconds. Done!As you can see in the below screenshot, all of the rows that have identical values in the first 3 columns have been located (first occurrences are not identified as duplicates).

If you want more options to dedupe your worksheets, use the Duplicate Remover wizard that can find duplicates with or without first occurrences as well as unique values. The detailed steps follow below.

Duplicate Remover wizard - more options to search for duplicates in ExcelDepending on a particular sheet you are working with, you may or may not want to treat the first instances of identical records as duplicates. One possible solution is using a different formula for each scenario, as we discussed in How to identify duplicates in Excel. If you are looking for a fast, accurate and formula-free method, try the Duplicate Remover wizard:

Hello Kyle!

You can find the answer to your question in this manual: How to find top values with duplicates. Replace the LARGE function in the suggested formulas with SMALL.

In Excel 365, you can use a much simpler FILTER formula that automatically handles ties.

This should solve your task.

Hi! To find the most frequent value by the condition, use the FILTER function to get an array of values where the values in column B are equal to cell D1 (for example, "city1"). Then use the INDEX MATCH function to select the most frequently occurring value from the first column of this array. Try to use this formula:

I have to input data in 15 different sheets in a single workbook of excel. I have to monitor that there should not be input duplicate value. like sheet to sheet check data and should not be a duplicate value in among all sheets. If i input data in next sheet i.e. 16th sheet it should be highlighted that the input value is duplicate.

Thanks for the lesson. I'm trying to find exact duplicates in a column of part numbers, and I'm getting duplicates for part numbers that are found in longer versions of themselves. For example, part number 1581H4 is matching as a duplicate to part number 1581H4DP as it is contained in this part number, thought they are not identical. It's like Apple is being matched to Applesauce.

Is there a formula for exact matches up to so many characters, if that would even work?

Thank-you very much. You've been very informative.

Jon

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