Excel Drop Down Lists - Data Validation (2023)

FAQs

Is there a limit to list data validation in Excel? ›

There are limits to the number of items that will show in a data validation drop down list: The list can show up to show 32,767 items from a list on the worksheet. If you type the items into the data validation dialog box (a delimited list), the limit is 256 characters, including the separators.

The only way to increase the size of a Data Validation drop-down list is to increase the zoom percentage at which you view the sheet.

Select the cells where the data validation is set, and then in the Ribbon, go to Data > Data Tools > Data Validation. This option is available with any validation criteria be it whole number, decimal, list, date, time, text length or a custom format. Make sure Ignore Blank is checked and then click OK.

By default, a data validation drop-down list only shows 8 items in the list when clicking the drop-down arrow. So you need to drag the scroll bar down for viewing more values in the list.

If data validation isn't working, make sure that: Users are not copying or filling data - Data validation is designed to show messages and prevent invalid entries only when users type data directly in a cell. When data is copied or filled, the messages do not appear.

Go to Data –> Data Tools –> Data Validation. In the Data Validation dialogue box, within the settings tab, select 'List' as Validation Criteria. In Source field, select the cells which have the items that you want in the drop down. Click OK.

Select the cells that you want to contain the lists. On the ribbon, click DATA > Data Validation. In the dialog, set Allow to List. Click in Source, type the text or numbers (separated by commas, for a comma-delimited list) that you want in your drop-down list, and click OK.

The length of the drop-down box is not big enough to display the entire text. What is this? The simple solution is to widen the column that the drop-down box is in. You can adjust the column manually by dragging the border of the column header.

Does Data Validation increase file size? ›

You may also consider reducing the number of formatting variations used in a workbook and the number of times you use data validation. These can both inflate the size of a workbook, so you'll especially want to check that formatting and data validation is not being applied to empty cells.

Remove Blanks Quickly

From the window that opens, select the Blanks option and hit OK. Now, right-click a selected cell, which will be a blank one, and click Delete. Hit OK and that's it! Now that all blanks are gone, we can create the Data Validation dropdown list without any blanks.

In the Data Validation dialog, select List from the Allow drop-down list, select the list including the blank cell you want to create data validation list based on and uncheck the Ignore blank option. 4. Click OK. Now you will see the first option in the data validation list is blank.

It's a list that we can select from in order to filter attendance data by department. The source of this dynamic data validation list has been created using the UNIQUE function. UNIQUE is a Dynamic Array Formula that returns all the unique values from a data range. In other words, it removes duplicates from a data set.

Shortcuts for expanding drop-down list. Select a cell that you want to expand its drop-down list. Press Alt + down arrow button, then the drop-down list is expanded. Press down arrow to choose the value in drop-down list that you want to fill in cell, press Enter key to fill it in cell.

The below validation errors are the most common and will respond with some details, including a list of validation messages. Validation errors typically occur when a request is malformed -- usually because a field has not been given the correct value type, or the JSON is misformatted.

Time - The user should enter a time. Text Length - It validates input based on the length of the data. Custom - It validates the user input using a custom formula.

Data validation is the process of checking the accuracy and quality of data before it is entered into a database or a spreadsheet. Data validation can help you avoid errors, inconsistencies, and duplicates that can affect your analysis and reporting.

Instead of limiting the drop down list to a single selection, you can use a bit of programming, combined with the data validation list, and allow multiple selections. With a few adjustments to the VBA code, you can display all the selected items across a row, or down a column, or keep them in a single cell.

How do you use data validation for multiple columns? ›

A cascading drop-down list is a series of dependent DropDownList controls in which one DropDownList control depends on the parent or previous DropDownList controls. The items in the DropDownList control are populated based on an item that is selected by the user from another DropDownList control.

To create a dynamic list, you need to specify which column of the table contains the information to be used in the drop-down list by naming the range of cells. I want Company A to Company H to appear in my drop-down list. Select cells A2 to A9. Give the cell range a name by typing it into the Name Box just above.

Copy drop down lists across multiple rows

To copy the dependent drop down list, let's do a regular copy/pasting: Select the cell with the secondary drop-down (C3) and press Ctrl + C to copy it. Select all other cells where you want the dependent list to appear (C4:C12) and press Ctrl + V to paste the copied contents.

In most cases: the worksheet had other cells with data validation in the same row. all dropdowns became the width of the widest dropdown. one of the data validation lists is in a merged cell.

Changing Needs: One of the most significant disadvantages of data validation is that data must be re-validated once specific changes to the data are made. As new data types and inputs are added, schema models and mapping documentation will need to be updated.

This is helpful when troubleshooting a workbook -- sometimes entire columns have data validation added, and that can cause Excel to slow down, or to crash. If you see a high number of data validation cells listed, you'll know where to focus your troubleshooting.

Click on the cell that is right for the top cell of the drop-down list, then select Insert, then select Symbols and select an arrow mark under wings from the drop-down list as represented in the below image, then click on Insert and close the pop-up window.

To remove any option user have to select it and by using the remove() function and getting the element by 'getElementById' and 'selectedIndex' methods the user can remove it.

How do I remove a value from a dropdown? ›

Select remove() Method

The remove() method is used to remove an option from a drop-down list. Tip: To add an option to a drop-down list, use the add() method.

If you spreadsheet is “Protected” or being “Shared” with another file, the Data validation tool is turned off in Excel. This is to protect the linked data from producing an error. Annoying right! In order to fix this issue, make sure you unprotect your worksheet.

Click the DATA tab, and click Data Validation. In the Data Validation dialog, set Allow to List; this enables a list in the cell. Leave In-cell drop-down selected; this enables a drop-down list in the cell.

"Text values in formulas are limited to 255 characters. To create longer text values in a formula, use the CONCATENATE function or the concatenation operator (&)."

Re: Excel multiple data validation

You can create two lots of data validation in one column based on another column by using a custom formula. Here's how you can do it: Select the cells you want to apply data validation to. Go to the Data tab on the ribbon and click on Data Validation.

To avoid this limitation, I can suggest using one of the following approaches: Add a hidden worksheet into your document, fill this worksheet with all required values for data validation and use a range of this worksheet as a data validation parameter.

How do I store more than 32767 characters in Excel? ›

Use multiple cells: If you need to enter more than 32,767 characters into a cell, you can simply split your data up into multiple cells. For example, if you have a list of 1,000 items that you need to enter into a single cell, you can simply put them into 10 different cells instead.

An Excel cell accepts only maximum 32767 characters.

The limit occurs due to an optimization technique where smaller strings are stored with the first byte holding the length of the string. Since a byte can only hold 256 different values, the maximum string length would be 255 since the first byte was reserved for storing the length.

By using VBA, you can create drop-down lists with multiple selections. With the ability to prevent duplicates and remove incorrect items, this feature can streamline data input and improve accuracy in your Excel spreadsheets.

To compare multiple columns in Excel, you can use the conditional formatting option on the home and format the setting to “duplicates” or “uniques”, and choose the desired color to highlight the values to compare multiple columns.

How Many Rows of Data Can Excel Handle? Excel spreadsheet can handle 1,048,576 rows and 16,384 columns at a time. If you are dealing with large datasets, it's inherent that you will have limitations using Excel Power Query.

Hands-on big data with Excel

In fact, Excel limits the number of rows in a spreadsheet to about one million; this may seem a lot, but rows of big data come in the millions, billions and even more. At this point Excel would appear to be of little help with big data analysis, but this is not true.