Return the logical value TRUE if a cell is blank or empty

=ISBLANK(value)

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Return the logical value TRUE if a cell is blank or empty and FALSE if the cell contains content (even if not visible).

ISBLANK is part of the collective IS functions which check specified values and return TRUE or FALSE depending on the outcome. The IS functions are useful for testing the outcome of a calculation and can be combined with the IF function in formulas to locate errors or get information about a value before performing another calculation.

The collective of IS functions are ISBLANK(value), ISERR(value), ISERROR(value), ISLOGICAL(value), ISNA(value), ISNONTEXT(value), ISNUMBER(value), ISREF(value) and ISTEXT(value).

To test the reverse of the function (e.g. to test if a cell is NOT blank), combine the ISBLANK and NOT functions - =NOT(ISBLANK(C7)) where cell reference C7 is the value being tested.

ISBLANK syntax requires a value to test. The value argument can be a blank (empty) cell, error, logical value, text, number, reference value, or a name referring to any of these.

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ISBLANK with text strings or numerical values.

In the examples below, the ISBLANK function is used to determine whether cells are empty or blank.

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Syntax

ISBLANK(value)

The ISBLANK function requires 1 value argument:

1. value. Required. Generally a cell reference.

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• Enter your formulas into the grey cells.

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Scope

ISBLANK can be used on its own to determine whether a cell is empty or blank or combined within a formula to test a value prior to performing additional operations.

Text:	=ISBLANK("Not Blank") || result is FALSE as cell value is Not Blank
Number:	=ISBLANK(22) || result is FALSE as cell value is 22
Date:	=ISBLANK(07/02/2022) || result is FALSE as cell value is the date 07/02/2022
Space or =" ":	=ISBLANK(C7) || result is FALSE as cell reference C7 contains a space
Formula:	=ISBLANK(C7) || result is FALSE as cell reference C7 contains a formula (e.g. =IF(C7+C8>10,"",C7+C8) will return what looks like a blank or empty cell if the contents of C7+C8 are greater than 10 whereas in reality the cell contains a formula).

Caveats

• Value arguments are not converted. Numeric values enclosed in double quotation marks are treated as text (e.g. "22"). Any IS functions requiring numeric values will therefore return a FALSE if the value is a text string.
• ISBLANK will return FALSE even if the cell contains an empty string (i.e. C7="", with no spaces). =C7="" and =LEN(C7)=0 which both return TRUE are alternative approaches for identifying cells which contain empty strings.

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Related Functions

• ISBLANK returns the logical value TRUE if a cell is blank or empty.
• ISERR returns the logical value TRUE for any error type except the #N/A error.
• ISERROR returns the logical value TRUE for any error type.
• ISLOGICAL returns the logical value TRUE if the cell contains either a TRUE or FALSE statement.
• ISNA returns the logical value TRUE if a cell contains the #N/A error
• ISNONTEXT returns the logical value TRUE if the cell contains any value that is not text.
• ISNUMBER returns the logical value TRUE if the cell contains a number.
• ISREF returns the logical value TRUE if the cell contains a reference.
• ISTEXT returns the logical value TRUE if the cell contains any text.

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Functions Category

• Information

 

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