You can remove duplicated data in a spreadsheet, which can easily happen if data such as mailing list information is combined from multiple sources.

1) Click in your data so Excel can find it.

2) Click Remove Duplicates on the Data tab of the ribbon. You’ll find it in the Data Tools group.

3) Select the columns that you want to check for duplicate entries. It’s safest to keep them all selected. If you just selected the First Name and Last Name (for example), two different people who share a name would be identified as duplicates, even though they have different addresses. One of them would be automatically deleted. This doesn’t happen if you select the address fields as well.

4) Click OK. Beware, though, as that might delete rows from your spreadsheet. Use Undo immediately to bring them back if you made a mistake.

Find more tips like this in 100 Top Tips – Microsoft Excel

£5.99
By Sean McManus
108 pages (notebook size)
ISBN: 9781840788792