Returns a table, built from one array per column. TABLE (Kind: { "Shirt", "Jacket" }, Price: { 29, 149 }) TABLE (Kind: { "Shirt"; "Jacket" }; Price: { 29; 149 }) returns a table of two rows, whose columns are named Kind and Price .

A table is an array of RECORD values, where each element is one row. TABLE is a convenience: it accepts a column at a time, which is the shape data usually arrives in, and assembles the rows for you.

A column is read using ! , which returns the whole column as an array:

That formula returns { 29, 149 }{ 29; 149 }.

All columns must have the same number of elements, as every row needs a value in every column. A #VALUE! error is returned if they do not.

A value which is an error does not make the whole table an error. The other values can still be read. In this formula, the price of a hat cannot be found, and the formula returns the array { 29, NA () }{ 29; NA () }:

TABLE and arrays of records are the same thing

TABLE builds an array of RECORD values, and nothing more. These two formulas are fully equivalent:

Both return the same table, and anything one can do, so can the other.

TABLE is worth using anyway. Data usually arrives as a column at a time rather than as a row at a time, which is the shape TABLE accepts. The equivalent array of records repeats every column name once per row, which grows tiresome quickly. A table of three columns and twenty rows names its columns three times using TABLE and sixty times when written out.

Looking up values in a table

XLOOKUP searches one column and returns the corresponding value from another. Name the table using LET, so that it need only be written once:

That formula returns 149, the price of the jacket.

XLOOKUP can also return a whole row rather than a single value, by searching a column and returning the table itself. Refer to the XLOOKUP documentation for that technique.