Auto filter sometimes doesn't filter and sometimes only partially filters

Hello everyone
Excel 2010.
I can usually click the Auto-filter icon I have added to my toolbar and that will select rows with only that data, as it should. However, I occassionally run into spreadsheets where:
1) I click the same icon and nothing is autofiltered, as if the icon had no effect whatsoever.
2) I click the same icon and only the items in rows above the chosen cell are filtered. For example, if I want to isolate the items identical to my data in B26, I click the cell then the icon, and all the rows above B26 that do not have the same content are filtered out, but rows below B26, with completely different data, are still displayed.

Any idea why I get this odd behaviour on some spreadsheets?
Thanks in advance!
JohnnyJoMP

Do you have blank rows in your spreadsheet.

Sometimes that can cause issues.

Also if cells are formatted differently as in text vs number that can affect it.
There could be a space before the first character that is causing it to have issues, so you could trim the cells.

I run into this issue when i export from certain programs.

I'm sure there are other solutions, it depends on the spreadsheets in question as there could be a number of possible solutions.

No blank rows, and no spaces in front of first characters, but the data comes from different sources,so quite likely it is in different formats. I will double check that. Thanks for the tips!
JJ

AHA!
I selected the entire spreadsheet and changed the format to "text". That didn't help. I selected the entire sheet again and changed it to "General", and autofilter worked as it should. You may be correct in your solution!
Thanks!
JJ

Originally Posted by johnnyjomp

AHA!
I selected the entire spreadsheet and changed the format to "text". That didn't help. I selected the entire sheet again and changed it to "General", and autofilter worked as it should. You may be correct in your solution!
Thanks!
JJ

I'm glad it worked!