This post will guide you how to use Google Sheets SEARCHB function with syntax and examples.

Description

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The Google Sheets SEARCHB function returns the number of the starting location of a substring in a text string counting each double-character as 2. You can use the SEARCHB function to locate a text string within another text string and returns the position of the first character of find_text within text.

The SEARCHB function can be used to calculate the position at which a string is first found within text counting each double-character as 2 in google sheets.  The purpose of this function is to get the location of text in the given string. And it’s returned value as a number representing the location of finding text.

The SEARCHB function is a build-in function in Google Sheets and it is categorized as a Text Function.

Syntax

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The syntax of the SEARCHB function is as below:

= SEARCHB(find_text, within_text,[start_num])

Where the SEARCHB function arguments are:

• find_text -This is a required argument. The substring that you want to find
• within_text -This is a required argument. The text string in which you want to search for the substring (find_text).
• Start_num -This is an optional argument. The starting position to search.

Note:

• The SEARCHB function will return the position of a find_text inside another text string. And if there is more than one occurrence of the find string, and the SEARCHB function returns the position of the first occurrence.
• If find_text string is not found, the SEARCHB function will return the #VALUE! Error value.
• When find text string is empty, the SEARCHB function will return 1.
• If start_num value is omitted, it is set to be 1 by default.
• The SEARCHB function is not case-sensitive. For example, “google” will match “GOOGLE”. If you wish to compare text where case matters, and you can use the FIND function.
• The SEARCHB function support wildcard characters.
• you can use another function called IFERROR function in combination with the SEARCHB function to check for cases when there are any matches to the search.
• Using SEARCH function for standard character sets and SEARCHB function for double-byte character sets such as Chinese, Japanese, and Korean.

Google Sheets SEARCHB Function Examples

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The below examples will show you how to use google sheets SEARCHB function to get the position of substring in a text string.

#1 To get the position of “google” text string in B1 cell, starting at the second position, just using formula:

= SEARCHB(“google”,B1,2) //it returns 7

#2 The search function use wildcard characters to look for a string starts with “go” characters in cell B1, using the following formula:

=SEARCHB(“go*”,B1,1) //it returns 7

#3 #VALUE! Error will be returned if find_text string is not found in with_text:

=SEARCH(“test”,”google”,1)   //it returns #VALUE!

#4 to get the position of a double-byte character sets “新“ within another Chinese text string, using the following formula:

=SEARCHB("新", "农历新年", 2) //it returns 5