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How to reference tab name in cell in Excel?

For referencing the current sheet tab name in a cell in Excel, you can get it done with a formula or User Define Function. This tutorial will guide you through as follows.

Reference the current sheet tab name in cell with formula
Reference the current sheet tab name in cell with User Define Function
Easily reference the current sheet tab name in cell with Kutools for Excel

Reference the current sheet tab name in cell with formula

Please do as follow to reference the active sheet tab name in a specific cell in Excel.

1. Select a blank cell, copy and paste the formula =MID(CELL("filename",A1),FIND("]",CELL("filename",A1))+1,255) into the Formula Bar, and the press the Enter key. See screenshot:

Now the sheet tab name is referenced in the cell.

Easily insert tab name in a specific cell, header or footer in worksheet:

The Kutools for Excel's Insert Workbook Information utility helps easily insert active tab name into a specific cell. Besides, you can reference workbook name, workbook path, user name etc. into a cell, worksheet's header or footer as you need. Click for details.
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Reference the current sheet tab name in cell with User Define Function

Besides the above method, you can reference the sheet tab name in a cell with User Define Function.

1. Press Alt + F11 to open the Microsoft Visual Basic for Applications window.

2. In the Microsoft Visual Basic for Applications window, click Insert > Module. See screenshot:

3. Copy and paste the below code into the Code window. And then press Alt + Q keys to close the Microsoft Visual Basic for Applications window.

VBA code: reference tab name

Function TabName()
  TabName = ActiveSheet.Name
End Function

4. Go to the cell which you want to reference the current sheet tab name, please enter =TabName() and then press the Enter key. Then the current sheet tab name will be display in the cell.

Reference the current sheet tab name in cell with Kutools for Excel

With the Insert Workbook Information utility of Kutools for Excel, you can easily reference the sheet tab name in any cell you want. Please do as follows.

1. Click Kutools Plus > Workbook > Insert Workbook Information. See screenshot:

2. In the Insert Workbook Information dialog box, select Worksheet name in the Information section, and in the Insert at section, select the Range option, and then select a blank cell for locating the sheet name, and finally click the OK button.

You can see the current sheet name is referenced into the selected cell. See screenshot:

  If you want to have a free trial (30-day) of this utility, please click to download it, and then go to apply the operation according above steps.

Demo: Easily reference the current sheet tab name in cell with Kutools for Excel

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Comments (24)
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Julia
Julia
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sorry your formulas and everything are incorrect on this page.
after direct copy/paste your THEORIES were WRONG
ZERO OUT OF TWO ATTEMPTS WORKED USING YOUR SUGGESTIONS
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crystal
crystal     Julia
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Hi Julia,
What kind of erro did you get?
To be mentioned, the formula provided in the post can only be applied in English system environment Excel. If you have Excel in a different language than English, please convert the formula from English to the language you are currently using.
You can translate the formula in this page: https://de.excel-translator.de/translator/
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petercat
petercat
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The formula at the top won't work until you save the file to your hard drive.
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ScottCE
ScottCE
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If you're using Excel Online. I found a solution for this issue.

You need to use 2 cells to make it work. As long as you have a cell that has the reference of a tab in its name, you can use FORMULATEXT() to turn that cells formula into a string and then extract the name that way. I can't imagine a scenario where you will want to reference another sheet and you wont already have a cell referencing that sheet for information on it, but you can always just make a blank/hidden (however you want to do it) cell that is just referencing the other sheet to set this formula up. In the below example, it is referencing cell B1 and cell B1 just contains =Sheet2!A1 as a reference to the sheet I want to name. If you use a name for a sheet with a space in it (example: Sheet 1) it would show up as (='Sheet 1'A1). I used an IF function and an ISERROR function to search if the string contains a space or not and two MID functions to extract the name of the sheet from both scenarios. If you update the name of the referenced sheet, cell B1 will change its formula and subsequently change the string and output the correct name each time.

=IF(ISERROR(FIND(" ",FORMULATEXT(B1))),MID(FORMULATEXT(B1),2,FIND("!",FORMULATEXT(B1))-2),MID(FORMULATEXT(B1),3,FIND("!",FORMULATEXT(B1))-4))
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Scott
Scott
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If you're using Excel Online. I found a solution for this issue.

You need to use 2 cells to make it work. As long as you have a cell that has the reference of a tab in its name, you can use FORMULATEXT() to turn that cells formula into a string and then extract the name that way. I can't imagine a scenario where you will want to reference another sheet and you wont already have a cell referencing that sheet for information on it, but you can always just make a blank/hidden (however you want to do it) cell that is just referencing the other sheet to set this formula up. In the below example, it is referencing cell B1 and cell B1 just contains =Sheet2!A1 as a reference to the sheet I want to name. If you use a name for a sheet with a space in it (example: Sheet 1) it would show up as (='Sheet 1'A1). I used an IF function and an ISERROR function to search if the string contains a space or not and two MID functions to extract the name of the sheet from both scenarios. If you update the name of the referenced sheet, cell B1 will change its formula and subsequently change the string and output the correct name each time.

=IF(ISERROR(FIND(" ",FORMULATEXT(B1))),MID(FORMULATEXT(B1),2,FIND("!",FORMULATEXT(B1))-2),MID(FORMULATEXT(B1),3,FIND("!",FORMULATEXT(B1))-4))
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Ailec
Ailec
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What I really want is to name some tabs using with the names on some cells from another sheet (same document of course). How can I do that?
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vanessa
vanessa
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Hi, I used the above suggestions but the first formula to reference the tab sheet name will not work on "excel" online. The second works, but the "Tabname" keeps showing the same tab name for all tabs on the workbook.
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crystal
crystal     vanessa
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Hi,
Sorry we didn't test in excel online. Can't help you with that yet. Thank you for your comment.
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vanessa
vanessa
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hello, i am having trouble referencing a sheet name into a cell with online excel
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Kurt
Kurt
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Excellent, thanks! Per: Reference the current sheet tab name in cell with formula
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Alister Hood
Alister Hood
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Sorry, the comment line is wrong - should be Ctrl-Alt-Shift-F9
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LuisV
LuisV
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FYI, you need to have more than one sheet in your workbook for this to work. Otherwise, the formula will display the filename but no sheet name.
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crystal
crystal     LuisV
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Good Day,
Thank you for your comment. I have tested the formula in a workbook that has only one sheet, but everything was running smoothly. The formula only displays the sheet name no matter how many worksheets existing in a workbook.
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lkelvin
lkelvin
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Hi, using the =MID(CELL("filename",A1),FIND("]",CELL("filename",A1))+1,255) formula in desktop excel works, but not in online excel.. can you explain why that is?it returns #value error in the cell.

is there a workaround for this? Thanks!
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Bob
Bob     lkelvin
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You are a champ! Nothing like a fix that one can copy and paste and have it work. Thank you.
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John
John
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Using the VBA macro, if I change the tab name the value in the cell does not get updated. Am I doing something wrong?
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Alister Hood
Alister Hood     John
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Of course nothing's ever simple with Microsoft products is it?
My solution actually breaks it, because it means everywhere you use the function it gets the name of the sheet where the last change was made, not the name of the sheet where the function is used.
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Alister Hood
Alister Hood     John
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Function TabName()
'Need to make it volatile otherwise it is never recalculated unless we do Ctrl-Shift-F9
Application.Volatile
TabName = ActiveSheet.Name
End Function
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INSTINE
INSTINE     John
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Dear John,
for best example let me tell you one thing.
if you want to change your code will be like this.

Function John()
John = ActiveSheet.Name
End Function
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crystal
crystal     John
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Dear John,
The formula can't update automatically. You need to refresh the formula manually after changing the tab name.
Sorry about that.
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Morgan
Morgan     crystal
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Refresh all formulas using the replace tool. Highlight everything, Find "=" (no quotes), Replace with "=" (no quotes). Nothing actually changes but every formula is reloaded.
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Jeffrey
Jeffrey     Morgan
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Ctrl-Alt-Shift-F9 refreshes all formulas and calculates all cells, including cells not marked as needing to be calculated.
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Vikas
Vikas
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Thank you very much. :-)
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David Polacheck
David Polacheck     Vikas
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Thanks all!
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