Array Formulas without Ctrl-Shift-Enter

Posted by: John Danaher, Engineer - Google spreadsheets

If you're an expert spreadsheet user, you might be familiar with the powerful and obscure feature known as array formulas. They're powerful because they let you replace an entire column of formulas with a single array formula that does all the calculations in one place. And they're obscure because you've always had to hit Ctrl-Shift-Enter to create one, and, well, who's ever going to discover that on their own?

It's now a lot simpler to create an array formula in Google Spreadsheets. If you want to create a multiple-output formula (like TRANSPOSE or MMULT), just enter the formula normally and hit enter. As if by magic, the entire output of the formula will appear. And if you want a multiple-input formula, wrap the whole formula in the ARRAYFORMULA function, like so: =ARRAYFORMULA(SUM(IF(A1:A10>B1:B10, A1:A10, B1:B10))).

And if you've never heard of array formulas but we've piqued your interest, take a look at our array formulas help page that explains them in a little more detail.