The Merge Sheets add-on for Google Sheets brings the latest data from additional sheets into your main table. Find and pull matching values, or add non-matching rows, if needed, in five simple steps.

Video: How to merge data in Google Sheets
Before you start
We care about your data and suggest you always create backup copies of your spreadsheets. A special option of the add-on will do that for you if you select it.
How to use Merge Sheets
Start the add-on
To open the tool, go to Extensions > Merge Sheets > Start:

Tip. You can also find Merge Sheets in the
Merge & Combine group in the
Power Tools add-on:
Step 1: Select your main table
Your main table is the one that will be updated as the result of the data processing:

You can choose the sheet with your main table from the Select your main sheet drop-down list.
By default, the add-on highlights the used range (cells with data till the first empty column & row) in your main sheet. You can edit the range either by manually typing the address in the Select the range with your table field or by clicking the Select range icon. You will then see a corresponding dialog box that will let you pick the necessary cells:

Tip. Click on the Auto select button to highlight that used range back.
Don't forget the Create a backup copy of the sheet checkbox to keep the original table.
Click Next to go to the second step.
Step 2: Choose the lookup sheets
The lookup sheet is the table that contains the information you want to copy to your main sheet. You can add multiple lookup sheets to get the data from all of them, one by one, in one go.
Note. At the moment, only standalone
Merge Sheets knows how to merge more than 2 tables at a time. If you use
Power Tools, this feature is coming soon.
Note. The add-on updates your main sheet with the info from the lookup sheets one by one: in the order lookup sheets appear in the add-on tree view.
Tip. Your lookup tables will not be modified in any way.

- Tick off the Sheets checkbox if you want to use all sheets from the tree view as lookup ones.
Tip. The disabled sheet is the one you selected as the main one on the previous step.
- To add more lookup sheets to the add-on, hit Add files from Drive.
Tip. To find the lookup spreadsheet in the Drive quickly, make use of a quick search. Just enter the part of the file name into the Search field of the Import files from Drive window and hit Find. Merge Sheets will check your entire Drive and get you the list of all files that match partially or completely.
If you're not sure where the found spreadsheet is located, simply hover your mouse cursor over it and you'll see a tip with a full path:
- To remove any unwanted spreadsheet from the list, select it and use the Exclude button.
- By default, the add-on includes all data from the selected sheets to the merge. But you can specify the range by clicking All data and doing one of the following:
Note. If your lookup sheet is in another file, you can click the
Open link to open the file in a new browser tab, check the range, and then change it in the add-on manually:
Click Next to proceed to the third step, or edit the main table by going Back.
Step 3: Identify matching columns
Here you are to pick those columns that appear in in all your tables (key columns). The add-on will compare these columns to identify the same (matching) records:

Tip. The columns you select on this step will not be modified.
Note. If you tick off more than one column, a record will be considered the same if the values in all these columns match.

- To see column titles, check the Main table has headers and Lookup table has headers boxes respectively. If there are no headers in your tables, uncheck these boxes to display column names instead.
- The 1st row content fields will help you see the top values in the main table columns.
- The add-on can find complete row matches if you select all columns using the top checkbox.
Note. Tick off all columns only if your lookup table(s) has(ve) non-matching columns that you're going to add to your main sheet. Otherwise, there will be no columns to update on the next step and you won't be able to proceed further.
- Make use of the Auto detect button to select the first column that appears in both tables with the same header.
Tip. All matching columns are marked in bold in the Main table columns list.
Note. The option is available only when there are header rows in your tables.
- If you don't want to match empty cells, pick the option Skip empty cells.
- Tick off Match case to consider the same records written in different text cases as non-matching and update them with different data.
- Make sure you choose the lookup table(s) columns to compare to the main table columns.
Click Next to go on to step 4.
Step 4: Pick columns to add or update in the main sheet
On this step, you are to decide what to do with other columns of the lookup table(s):

- Tick off the column of interest, click on the Action field and choose what to do with the column:
- Check this box to select all columns at once and add their values to the end of the original table. Uncheck back to unselect all columns if you don't want to add or update any.
- The Auto detect button will automatically pick the Update values in action for all remaining columns with the same headers.
Note. The option is available only when there are header rows in your tables.
- If there are lots of columns, you can filter the list using the respective option in the Show columns drop-down list:

Click Next to follow to the last step.
Step 5: Tweak additional options
This step offers a set of additional options to match, update, or add values:

Place results to
Add rows and columns
Update cells
- Update only empty cells in the main table. If you have blank cells in the column you are updating in your main table, keep all cells that already have records untouched. The existing values in the main table will not be overwritten:

- To avoid copying empty cells from the lookup table(s), tick off the option Update only if cells from the lookup table contain data:

Highlight cells
- If you already have some rows highlighted, you can remove their current filling using the option to Clear background color in the columns you are updating. Any existing background color in the column you selected to update will be removed.
- You can see all cells that were changed in the main table by selecting the option Set background color of updated cells.
Tip. Click on the arrow next to this option to pick a hue from the list.
Get the results
Click Finish to merge Google spreadsheets and you'll see the number of processed lookup sheets, inserted columns, added and updated rows:

You'll also get a link to open a new spreadsheet if you chose to place the result there instead of updating your main table.
How to work with scenarios
If you rely on Merge Sheets for Google Sheets to pull data from other tabs, most likely you have to update lots of different sheets or even the same sheet often. To save your time on these operations, we introduced scenarios.
What is a scenario?
The scenario is a saved set of the options you select on each step of the add-on.
You will have a chance to save the settings once the add-on processes your data. Then, just run this scenario, and the tool will start updating the info in your spreadsheet immediately.
Save the scenario
To create your scenario, click Save scenario in the result message once the add-on processes your data:

You will see your future scenario outline with the options you've just used. You can adjust some of these settings to your convenience:

- Name your scenario in a way to understand what it does and find it among other scenarios quickly.
- Choose your main and lookup sheets:
- Identify ranges to process in your main and lookup sheets:
- Select [All data] to automatically detect the entire used ranges for work.
- For the tool to handle the exact cells, simply enter the desired ranges of cells.
- Check if all other options you've just used are correct:
Note. You cannot change these options. To modify them, please restart the add-on to pick the correct settings on steps 1-5.
Once everything's set, click Save and the scenario will be created.
Run your scenario
To start the scenario, go to Extensions > Merge Sheet > Scenarios, find the necessary name and click Start.
Note. If you don't see Scenarios in the menu, just click Extensions > Merge Sheets > Start to open the add-on itself once. This is necessary for new spreadsheets and those where the add-on hasn't been run yet. Your scenario (and all future ones) will then appear in the menu automatically.

This will run the tool and start processing your data right away per all the settings.
In the end, you will get the result message saying what scenario has been used, how many lookup sheets have been processed and what number of rows and columns have been found and modified:

Manage scenarios
To edit your existing scenario, go to Extensions > Merge Sheet > Scenarios, pick the scenario and click Edit this time:

You will see the familiar scenario outline. The editable fields are the same: name, sheets, and data ranges.

Press Delete to remove the scenario forever, Save to keep the changes, and Run to start it right away with the new settings.
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