Importing only certain rows between spreadsheet documents

Question

Document 1 has many rows of data.

How do I import into document 2 only those rows that have a certain value in column C?

Answer 1

Basics:

This is not as straight forward as a normal import using the IMPORT function. With this function, you are able to perform imports only:

=IMPORTRANGE("key","range")

Adding a function, like SUM or FILTER, within the "range" string will result in an error. The solution must be found, by using the QUERY function:

=QUERY(IMPORTRANGE("key","range"),"SELECT * WHERE Col1='value'")

OR

=QUERY(IMPORTRANGE("key","A:Z"),"SELECT * WHERE Col1 contains 'value'")

NOTE:

After WHERE, Column definition must be as first letter upper-case then lower case. Col will work, COL or col will not.

Ordering:

Once imported you can order the results by using the ORDER BY clause:

=QUERY(IMPORTRANGE("key","A:Z"),"SELECT * WHERE Col1 contains 'value' ORDER BY Col1")

Select columns:

So the IMPORTRANGE function cannot do selected columns, it can only do one range block. The way around this is to use the QUERY function SELECT clause:

=QUERY(IMPORTRANGE("key","A:Z"),"SELECT Col1, Col2, Col3 WHERE Col1 contains 'value' ORDER BY Col1")

References:

• IMPORTRANGE function: IMPORTRANGE
• Usage of QUERY in combination with IMPORT function: QUERY/IMPORT
• Usage of WHERE clause in QUERY function: QUERY/WHERE
• Usage of ORDER BY clause in QUERY function: QUERY/ORDER BY

Answer 2

Had this same issue: This is what I ended up using.

=iferror(QUERY(IMPORTRANGE("https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/[YOUR_KEY_FROM_URL]/edit","Title of Sheet You are Using!A2:I42"),"select * WHERE Col5 CONTAINS 'Towel'",1),"no values yet!")

Lets break it down a bit

IFERROR allows you to display a user friendly message if this fail because no data is returned

QUERY allows you to specify the search criteria. You can omit this if you simply want to import the range of cell regardless.

IMPORTRANGE Use the url provided, then fetch this sheet, looking at these ranges (top left, to bottom right)