Google Sheets Formula Explainer
Paste a formula — including Sheets-only functions like QUERY and ARRAYFORMULA — and see each function and argument explained in plain English.
Formula
Breakdown
QUERY(A1:D100, "SELECT A, B WHERE C = 'Active' ORDER BY B DESC")
Runs a SQL-like query against a range — filtering, sorting, and selecting columns in a single formula.
- A1:D100 — range to query
- "SELECT A, B WHERE C = 'Active' ORDER BY B DESC" — the query string, e.g. "SELECT A, B WHERE C = 'x'"
How it works
Google Sheets formulas can combine functions you already know from Excel with Sheets-specific ones that work quite differently — QUERY embeds a small SQL-like language inside a text argument, and ARRAYFORMULA changes how an entire formula behaves rather than adding an argument. This tool parses the formula into its individual function calls, innermost first, and explains each one.
Want to build a Sheets formula from scratch instead? Try the Google Sheets Formula Generator.
Examples
QUERY with filtering and sorting
The SQL-like query string explained as one argument.
=QUERY(A1:D100, "SELECT A, B WHERE C = 'Active' ORDER BY B DESC")
ARRAYFORMULA
Applied to a whole range at once.
=ARRAYFORMULA(B2:B100 * C2:C100)
Nested lookup with error handling
Two functions, explained separately.
=IFERROR(VLOOKUP(A2, Sheet2!A:D, 3, FALSE), "Not found")