How to find if a column cell is empty in Google Sheets?

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Here’s a question from Donnie:

I manage a large Google Sheets spreadsheet that lists the software that should be installed in each of our employees’ computer. All systems should have the same software installed. Every time i install a program i update the spreadsheet. I would like to write a simple formula that will manage whether the system was fully installed or not, but having some issues writing the COUNT function. Any ideas?

Check if a column has empty cells in Sheets

Summary

Use the following formula to check whether a cell is bank in a Google Sheets column range:

=if (COUNTBLANK(column_range > 0,"value_if_true", "value_if_false")

Step # 1: Prepare your spreadsheet

Start by creating a Google Sheets spreadsheet (if you haven’t done so yet). Then import or manually type your data. Identify the column range tin which would like to look for empty cells.

Here’s the spreadsheet i will use – we’ll have two columns: a Software and Status.

Step # 2: Write your formula

We’ll now check for blank cells in the Status column range B3:B9:

=if (COUNTBLANK(B4:B9) > 0,"Not Finished", "Finished")

Explanation

  • We use the If function that allows to evaluate a boolean condition (TRUE or FALSE) and take action if true an other action if not.
  • The condition is defined using the COUNTBLANK function – which simply counts empty cells.
  • If there any empty cells – the installation status is set to Not Finished (like in our example).
  • Otherwise (if all cells contains any text) the status is Finished.

Find if the entire column contains empty cells

We can easily check if our entire column is completely full using a similar statement:

=if (COUNTBLANK(E:E) > 0,"Contains empty cells", "Full")

Explanation

  • We use an if statement as shown above.
  • We check blank cells in the entire column range (Column E).
  • If there are empty cells a Contains empty cells value is displayed.