TYPE - Microsoft Office Excel

Returns the type of value. Use TYPE when the behavior of another function depends on the type of value in a particular cell.

Syntax

TYPE(value)

Value can be any Microsoft Excel value, such as a number, text, logical value, and so on.

Remarks

TYPE is most useful when you are using functions that can accept different types of data, such as ARGUMENT and INPUT. Use TYPE to find out what type of data is returned by a function or formula.
You cannot use TYPE to determine whether a cell contains a formula. TYPE only determines the type of the resulting, or displayed, value. If value is a cell reference to a cell that contains a formula, TYPE returns the type of the formula's resulting value.

Example

The example may be easier to understand if you copy it to a blank worksheet.

Create a blank workbook or worksheet.
Select the example in the Help topic.
Note Do not select the row or column headers.
Selecting an example from Help
Press CTRL+C.
In the worksheet, select cell A1, and press CTRL+V.
To switch between viewing the results and viewing the formulas that return the results, press CTRL+` (grave accent), or on the Formulas tab, in the Formula Auditing group, click the Show Formulas button.

1

2

A
Data
Smith
Formula	Description (Result)
=TYPE(A2)	Checks the type of the value above (2)
=TYPE("Mr. "&A2)	Checks the type of "Mr. Smith" (2)
=TYPE(2+A2)	Checks the type of the formula, which returns the error #VALUE! (16)
=TYPE({1,2;3,4})	Checks the type of an array constant (64)

See also: