How to Find Blank Cells in Excel (select, count, fill)

By Srini Vanamala / September 29, 2026 / Data Cleaning
How to Find Blank Cells in Excel (select, count, fill)

Select every blank cell

  1. Select your data range.
  2. Press F5 › Special › Blanks › OK.

All empty cells are now selected. More in Go To Special.

Fill them all with 0 (or any text)

With the blanks selected, type 0 and press Ctrl+Enter. Every selected cell gets it.

Fill with the value above

With the blanks selected, type =, press ↑, then Ctrl+Enter. Copy › Paste Values afterwards to fix the result.

Count them

=COUNTBLANK(A2:A100)

Highlight them

Home › Conditional Formatting › Highlight Cells Rules › More Rules › Format only cells with: Blanks. See conditional formatting.

Filter for them

Filter arrow › untick all › tick (Blanks).

Cells that look blank but aren’t

A space or a formula returning “” isn’t truly blank, so Go To Special skips it. Test with ISBLANK and clean spaces with TRIM.

Remove whole empty rows: delete blank rows

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Srini Vanamala

20 years with spreadsheets and enterprise systems. Writes one short, plain-English Excel lesson a day. Got an Excel question? learnexceleasycom@gmail.com

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