Is there a way to get the `IF()` statement to output nothing if it returns false?

Question

I've got the following formula

=if(sum(b1:b5)>1, "Yes")

If that equates to true the formula will input "Yes" into the cell.

If that equates to false the formula will input "FALSE" into the cell, this is Google sheet's default action.

To prevent the word "FALSE" being used, I could update the formula to the following :

=if(sum(b1:b5)>1, "Yes", "")

If that equates to true the formula will input "Yes" into the cell.

If that equates to false the formula will input "" into the cell, the problem is that "" is still a string, this will make other formulas like ISBLANK() or COUNTA behave seemingly incorrectly. I know there are ways around this with these other formulas, but it feels more semantic to get to the root of the problem in the IF() formula, rather than try and fix it downstream with another formula.

Is there a way to get the IF() statement to output nothing if it returns false ?

Answer 1

You could use an empty parameter to not depend on the a blank cell

instead of

=if(sum(b1:b5)>1, "Yes", "")

use

=if(sum(b1:b5)>1, "Yes", )

Another common practice is to use IFERROR(1/0) instead of an empty parameter but this works because the same way because the second argument of IFERROR is empty.

Related

• How to get a cell to show blank if it cannot lookup the search key?

Answer 2

It seems there is no literal for a blank/empty/null cell in Google Sheets. Using that as the third IF argument would be an elegant solution. Something else that works: designate a cell, say, A56, to be kept blank. The following formula would satisfy ISBLANK() (if the sum is 1 or lower):

=if(sum(b1:b5)>1, "Yes", $A$56)

The dollar signs aren't necessary of course, but they can be useful when reusing the formula.