I want Excel to use the information in table 1 ... Another effective way to look up and retrieve values is through INDEX and ...

An curved arrow pointing right. Once you have mastered VLOOKUP in Excel it's time to move on to INDEX/MATCH. This formula combination gives the same results but without the problems of VLOOKUP.

As a long-term Excel enthusiast, I have always enjoyed using VLOOKUP, one of Excel's best-known lookup functions. However, Microsoft's introduction of XLOOKUP in 2019 changed everything.