Auto-Complete may not work

Symptoms

You type text in a cell in Microsoft Excel. The first few characters of the text that you type match an existing entry in that column. When this occurs, the Auto-Complete feature may not automatically fill in the remaining characters.

Cause

In Microsoft Excel, the Auto-Complete feature may not fill in the remaining characters if the algorithm that Excel uses detects a header row in the list.

More information

Example

When you use the steps in the following example, the Auto-Complete feature doesn't appear to function properly.

1. Save and close any open workbooks, and then create a new workbook.

2. In cell A1, type ABC in uppercase.

3. In cell A2, type a in lowercase and don't press ENTER.

   The Auto-Complete feature automatically inserts aBC in cell A2.

4. Continue typing abc in lowercase in cell A2, and then press ENTER.

   This overwrites the text that is suggested by Auto-Complete.

5. In cell B1, type ABC in uppercase.

6. In cell B2, type a in lowercase and don't press ENTER.

   The Auto-Complete feature doesn't automatically suggest "aBC" in cell B2 as it does in step 3.

Because the characters in cell A1 are all uppercase, and the characters in cell A2 are all lowercase, Microsoft Excel determines that row 1 is a list header row. The algorithm for the Auto-Complete feature doesn't generate suggested text if the first row is considered a list header row. This behavior also occurs if characters in cell A2 are uppercase and lowercase.