Problem with QUERY(IMPORTRANGE()) to retrieve data

Question

I’m having a problem with the =QUERY(IMPORTRANGE()) formula while retrieving a column data from one spreadsheet to another.

=QUERY(IMPORTRANGE("spreedsheetURL","Sheet1!A2"),"select Col2 WHERE Col1 Contains B3")

I want to retrieve data from the column2 spreadsheet(A) to column2 spreadsheet(B) where column1 spreadsheet(A) is equal to the column1 spreadsheet(B).

The error I get is:

Formula parse error.

Answer 1

=QUERY(IMPORTRANGE("URL"; "Sheet1!A2:B"); "select Col2 where Col1 contains '"&B3&"'"; 0)

Answer 2

Maybe the error "Formula parse error" occurs because your spreadsheet use semicolon as argument separator instead of comma. Replace the commas by semicolons (;)

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It's not possible to directly compare to a cell by including the cell address into the SQL argument of QUERY. Also there is no Col2 in Sheet!A2, this is referring to only once cell. If this is correct instead of QUERY use IF

=IF(IMPORTRANGE("spreedsheetURL","Sheet1!A2") = B3, "spreedsheetURL","Sheet1!A2") , )

If you want to retrieve whole column A, instead of "Sheet1!A2" use "Sheet1!A:A"

Assuming Sheet1!A:A and B3 contains numbers, the formula to use should be

=QUERY(IMPORTRANGE("spreedsheetURL","Sheet1!A:A"),"select Col1 WHERE Col1 Contains "&B3)

Assuming Sheet1!A:A and B3 contains text, the formula to use should be

=QUERY(IMPORTRANGE("spreedsheetURL","Sheet1!A:A"),"select Col1 WHERE Col1 Contains '"&B3&"'")