Please Note: This article is written for users of the following Microsoft Excel versions: 2007, 2010, 2013, 2016, 2019, and Excel in Office 365. 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: Filling References to Another Workbook.
='[Sales Master.xls]Sheet1'!$A$5The presence of the dollar signs means that this is an absolute reference to the cell. Because of this, you cannot use any of Excel's automatic fill options, such as Fill Right (Ctrl+R) or Fill Down (Ctrl+D) or AutoFill, and get the results you expect. Instead, every cell in the filled cells will reference the exact same cell in the external workbook. The solution to the problem is to make a quick modification to the referencing formula before you do the fill. If you remove the dollar signs (both of them), then the formula is now relative, and filling will work the way you expect.
ExcelTips is your source for cost-effective Microsoft Excel training. This tip (10482) applies to Microsoft Excel 2007, 2010, 2013, 2016, 2019, and Excel in Office 365. You can find a version of this tip for the older menu interface of Excel here: Filling References to Another Workbook.
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2018-07-09 03:02:11
Alan
A shortcut to removing them is to use the F4 key whilst in edit mode.
2016-03-08 23:30:47
Abdul Malek
Wow!!! great work.
Thank you!
2015-09-08 12:30:17
Keith
This worked great! Thank you!
2015-09-03 15:18:19
sara
I have a workbook with 2 sheets. Sheet one is a list of flavors and store numbers. Sheet two is a color coded spreadsheet with flavors and stores. I have it set up to insert a "check mark" on sheet 1 for a specific store and flavor. I would like to have this information auto populate to sheet 2 with the correct color and column.
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Please Note:
This article is written for users of the following Microsoft Excel versions: 2007, 2010, 2013, 2016, 2019, and Excel in Office 365. 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: 
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