Overview 

Return custom value in VLookup of Excel is an article that will help you understand how you can return a custom value when your VLookup succeeds. 

Good to know 

This exercise for returning a custom value in VLookup requires you to know the IF function, nested functions, and a basic understanding of how to use VLookup in Excel. 

If you do not have the basic idea of these topics, refer to the following articles that will help you learn the prerequisite and then come back to this article to continue learning how to return a custom value in VLookup of Excel. 

• How to use IF Function in Excel
• How to use Nested Functions in Excel
• How to use VLookup in Excel

Click on the following button to download the file used in the demo to practice along with us.

Solution 

To clarify how to return a custom value in VLookup of Excel, I will break the entire formula into pieces. Under each segment, I will explain the process in how we will move forward from that point. I will divide this exercise into steps to make it easy for you to understand.

Step 01 

In the first step, I will run VLookup to find the employee ID in the given dataset. If the value is not found in the dataset, VLookup returns #N/A, which indicates no value for that specific employee ID. See the image below for reference.

Step 02 

After running VLookup successfully, we will place it under the IFERROR function to handle the errors when a value is not found. This way, each time the VLookup fails to return a value or does not find a relative value for that lookup, we can produce a custom value. See the image below for reference.

Step 03 

After handling the error message smoothly, we will place this entire VLookup function and IFERROR under the IF Function. Under the first part of the IF Function,  we will place the VLookup function and IFERROR  to test and see if it returns “NOT FOUND” as the value.

If the test under IF FUnction succeeds, it shall return “NOT FOUND” as the value, which indicates that the VLookup failed and could not find the relevant value. However, if the VLookup succeeds to fetch a relative value, the IF Function will fail to indicate the success of VLookup. At this time, we can put a custom value as we desire. We have placed the custom value as “Found it”. See the image and below for reference.

Return custom value in VLookup Video Tutorial

If you desire to watch and learn to Return custom value in VLookup iin excel, here is a quick demonstration for you.

Excel Learning Series – TOC

1. Excel 2016 – Basics – Find Sum, Average, Min and Max
2. Excel 2016 Difference Between Formulas and Functions
3. Excel 2016 Copy Formulas or Functions
4. Microsoft Excel Auto Fill
5. Excel 2016 Manage Views using Freeze Panes
6. Microsoft Excel – Saving Workbooks
7. Excel Upper and Lower Text Functions
8. Excel 2016 – Text Function – Proper
9. Excel Text Functions – Trim Function
10. Excel – Text Function Left Function
11. Excel Text Function – Right Function
12. Excel Text Functions – MID Function
13. Excel Concatenate Text Function
14. Excel Nested Functions
15. Excel Search Function
16. Excel – Calculate Age using Date Function Today
17. Calculate Tenure in Excel with Days Function
18. Autofill Dates in Excel
19. Formatting Dates in Excel
20. Excel Date Format Shortcut
21. Calculating Sum of Time in Excel
22. Calculate Expiry Date in Excel 2016 – EDATE
23. Find Age or Tenure using DATEDIF in Excel 2016
24. RandBetween – Generate Random Dates in Excel 2016
25. Excel Weekday Function
26. Excel WeekNum and ISOWeekNum Functions
27. Excel Networkdays and Excel Networkdays.INTL
28. Excel Workday and Workdays INTL Functions
29. Excel DATEVALUE AND TIMEVALUE
30. Calculate Time Difference in Excel
31. Calculate Quarter in Excel
32. Rounding Day, Hour and Minutes in Excel
33. Excel Pay Rate and Downtime Cost Calculation
34. Excel Logical Functions IF, AND, OR
35. Calculate Bonus in Excel Using IF Function
36. Excel Learning – SumIF and SumIFS
37. How to use Excel Count Functions
38. How to use VLOOKUP in Excel
39. How to vLookup in a different workbook in Excel
40. VLookup for Multiple Sheets with Example
41. Excel Custom Quarters
42. Vlookup Return Custom Value

We hope you find this article useful. In case you are stuck and or need help, feel free to drop a comment below or submit your question. Do share it further and add your feedback about the article in the comments section.