Symptoms
When you try to use the Find utility to search for data in an Excel workbook, you may receive an error message similar to the following:
Microsoft Excel cannot find the data you're searching for. Check your search options, location and formatting.
Cause
This issue may occur if you are searching for text, values, or formatting that is contained in a filtered list, and the filtering criteria prevents the text, values, or formatting from being displayed.
Workaround
To work around this issue, set the filter criteria to Show All on each worksheet in your workbook before you perform the search. To do this, follow these steps:
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Start Excel, and then open the workbook that you want to search.
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On the Data menu, point to Filter, and then click Show All.
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Repeat step 2 for each sheet in the workbook.
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Perform the search.
Status
Microsoft has confirmed that this is a problem in Excel 2003.
