Please Note: This article is written for users of the following Microsoft Excel versions: 2007, 2010, and 2013. If you are using an earlier version (Excel 2003 or earlier), this tip may not work for you. For a version of this tip written specifically for earlier versions of Excel, click here: Tracking Down Invalid References.
Written by Allen Wyatt (last updated December 3, 2021)
This tip applies to Excel 2007, 2010, and 2013
Joel noted that when he closes a workbook that has thousands of formulas in it he is getting this message lately: "A formula in this worksheet contains one or more invalid references." Joel wonders how he can know which of the seven worksheets in this workbook is being referred to. How can I find the errant formula? I do not observe any problems in the display of information on my reports.
Tracking down invalid references can be frustrating. There are several places you can start to look. The first is in the formulas that are on the worksheets. (Yes, you need to do these steps for each worksheet in the workbook.) Use the Go To Special dialog box (press F5 and choose Special) to choose to go to only the cells that contain errors. You can then use the Tab key to move amongst any cells that Excel selects.
You could also use the Find tool to look for possible errors. Just press Ctrl+F to display the Find tab of the Find and Replace dialog box, then search for the # character. Make sure you tell Excel to do its searching within Formulas. Inspect anything that is found to see if it is an error or not.
You should also take a look at any named ranges defined in your workbook. Look at each name in the Name Manager dialog box (Formulas tab, click the Name Manager tool), making sure that whatever is in the Refers To column doesn't include any error indications.
These aren't all the places that there could be errors; Excel is really good at letting errors exist in lots of places. If you need to search for errors often, you might try a macro that looks through your formulas for any potential errors.
Sub CheckReferences() ' Check for possible missing or erroneous links in ' formulas and list possible errors in a summary sheet Dim iSh As Integer Dim sShName As String Dim sht As Worksheet Dim c, sChar As String Dim rng As Range Dim i As Integer, j As Integer Dim wks As Worksheet Dim sChr As String, addr As String Dim sFormula As String, scVal As String Dim lNewRow As Long Dim vHeaders vHeaders = Array("Sheet Name", "Cell", "Cell Value", "Formula") 'check if 'Summary' worksheet is in workbook 'and if so, delete it With Application .ScreenUpdating = False .DisplayAlerts = False .Calculation = xlCalculationManual End With For i = 1 To Worksheets.Count If Worksheets(i).Name = "Summary" Then Worksheets(i).Delete End If Next i iSh = Worksheets.Count 'create a new summary sheet Sheets.Add After:=Sheets(iSh) Sheets(Sheets.Count).Name = "Summary" With Sheets("Summary") Range("A1:D1") = vHeaders End With lNewRow = 2 ' this will not work if the sheet is protected, ' assume that sheet should not be changed; so ignore it On Error Resume Next For i = 1 To iSh sShName = Worksheets(i).Name Application.Goto Sheets(sShName).Cells(1, 1) Set rng = Cells.SpecialCells(xlCellTypeFormulas, 23) For Each c In rng addr = c.Address sFormula = c.Formula scVal = c.Text For j = 1 To Len(c.Formula) sChr = Mid(c.Formula, j, 1) If sChr = "[" Or sChr = "!" Or _ IsError(c) Then 'write values to summary sheet With Sheets("Summary") .Cells(lNewRow, 1) = sShName .Cells(lNewRow, 2) = addr .Cells(lNewRow, 3) = scVal .Cells(lNewRow, 4) = "'" & sFormula End With lNewRow = lNewRow + 1 Exit For End If Next j Next c Next i ' housekeeping With Application .ScreenUpdating = True .DisplayAlerts = True .Calculation = xlCalculationAutomatic End With ' tidy up Sheets("Summary").Select Columns("A:D").EntireColumn.AutoFit Range("A1:D1").Font.Bold = True Range("A2").Select End Sub
This macro creates a worksheet called "Summary" that is used to list information about any errors detected in the worksheet links.
You can also use Excel MVP Bill Manville's FindLink program, which does an amazing job of locating information in links. You could use the add-in to search for the # character in all your links, which should help you locate the errors. It is unclear as to whether the add-in will work with Excel 2013, as the last update for the file (as of this writing) was in 2011. It is worth trying though; more information on FindLink can be found here:
http://www.manville.org.uk/software/findlink.htm
Note:
ExcelTips is your source for cost-effective Microsoft Excel training. This tip (8664) applies to Microsoft Excel 2007, 2010, and 2013. You can find a version of this tip for the older menu interface of Excel here: Tracking Down Invalid References.
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2021-12-03 08:27:45
Joe
One place I find a lot of this kind of thing is in graph ranges.
2017-12-02 10:42:38
Sparrows D
Ha! Great! I entered #GivingTuesday in one of my cells (as a category of donations) and Excel saw this as an Error in my formula. I'm so dumb.
Microsoft, the internet, and hashtags, will become very popular sometime in the very distant future, learn to deal with it.
2017-10-30 03:40:21
Chris Sharpe
Alan, I can confirm that the FindLink Addin works fine in Excel 2016. A fantastically useful tool, part of my essential armoury. Many thanks to Bill for creating it. http://www.manville.org.uk/software/findlink.htm
2016-11-17 23:57:54
Vaughan
Can't use different forms of .Count in these two places as Worksheets.Count does not count hidden Sheets, whereas Sheets.Count does
iSh = Worksheets.Count
'create a new summary sheet
Sheets.Add After:=Sheets(iSh)
Sheets(Sheets.Count).Name = "Summary"
would be better as:
iSh = Sheets.Count
'create a new summary sheet
Sheets.Add After:=Sheets(iSh)
Sheets(Sheets.Count).Name = "Summary"
2016-05-13 09:24:06
Ben S.
I had to add "Set rng = Nothing" at the bottom of the loop and a check for it at the top because it was falsely reporting formulas on sheets that did no have any, when a previous sheet had some.
Allen, send me an email and I'll send you my update. I also added a status message, freeze panes, hourglass cursor, beep at end.
2016-04-20 15:47:09
Ben
Thank you for the very helpful tip!
2016-02-24 06:53:47
Willy Vanhaelen
@Andrija
Your are right but in this case you can better replace those 3 lines with:
Sheets("Summary").Range("A1:D1") = vHeaders
Since Sheets("Summary") is used only once it has no sence to use With ... End With
2016-02-23 07:19:58
Andrija
Missing dot in front of word 'Range':
With Sheets("Summary")
Range("A1:D1") = vHeaders
End With
2016-02-02 13:44:30
Rick Sheeley
Excellent tip, found 90% of issues.
2016-02-02 10:40:17
Kenny
Another place where this invalid references can occur is in charts.
2016-01-03 06:53:51
gbalfany
This did not find my problem. I am workign with excel files that save out on SharePoint 2007; several of them have the error:
"We found a problem with one or more formula references in this worksheet. Check that the cell references, range names, defined names and links to other workbooks in your formulas are all correct."
2015-09-10 11:41:53
Ta
The Macro code solved the problem for me.
Thank you
2015-07-01 15:59:29
Thanks for useful code!
Just small improvment for easy to go to cell:-)
...
vHeaders = Array("Sheet Name", "Cell", "Link", "Cell Value", "Formula")
....
With Sheets("Summary")
.Cells(lNewRow, 1) = sShName
.Cells(lNewRow, 2) = addr
.Cells(lNewRow, 3).FormulaR1C1 = "=HYPERLINK(""#""&RC[-2]&""!""&RC[-1],""GO!"")"
.Cells(lNewRow, 4) = scVal
.Cells(lNewRow, 5) = "'" & sFormula
End With
.....
Martin
2014-06-09 16:56:43
madscijr
A couple of issues + fixes:
1. The line
Dim c, sChar As String
will give the compile error:
"For Each control variable must be Variant or Object"
This can be fixed by replacing the above with:
Dim c As Variant
Dim sChar As String
2. It is a good idea to include a DoEvents statement at the top of your loops. This basically tells the PC to see if Windows and any other applications have any processing to do, and allow them to do it, so that Excel doesn't hog 100% of your CPU, which can freeze up your machine until the loop in your macro is finished. So you would change above to look like:
' For i = 1 To iSh
' DoEvents
' ...
' For Each c In rng
' DoEvents
' ...
' For j = 1 To Len(c.Formula)
' DoEvents
' ...
' Next j
' Next c
' Next i
3. In VBA and VBScript, before exiting a given scope such as a sub or function, it is a best practice to explicitly release any objects (non-primitive types) from memory.
Adding the following lines to the bottom of the routine (right before End Sub) would protect against memory leaks (in any case they can't hurt):
' release objects from memory
Set wks = Nothing
Set sht = Nothing
Set rng = Nothing
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