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You can use the following formulas in Excel to find the earliest date in a particular column based on specific criteria:
Method 1: Find Earliest Date Based on One Criteria
=MIN(IF($A$2:$A$13=F1,$C$2:$C$13))
This particular formula finds the earliest date in the range C2:C13 where the value in the range A2:A13 is equal to the value in cell F1.
Method 2: Find Earliest Date Based on Multiple Criteria
=MINIFS(C2:C13, A2:A13, F1, B2:B13, F2)
This particular formula finds the earliest date in the range C2:C13 where the value in the range A2:A13 is equal to the value in cell F1 and the value in the range B2:B13 is equal to the value in cell F2.
The following examples show how to use each formula in practice with the following dataset in Excel that contains information about when basketball players joined various teams:
Example 1: Find Earliest Date Based on One Criteria in Excel
Suppose we would like to find the earliest date among players who are on the Rockets team.
We can specify the Rockets team name in cell F1 and then type the following formula into cell F2 to find the earliest date:
=MIN(IF($A$2:$A$13=F1,$C$2:$C$13))
The following screenshot shows how to use this formula in practice:
By default, Excel displays the date in a numeric format.
To convert this to a recognizable date format, select cell F2 and then click the Number Format dropdown menu on the Home tab and then click Short Date:
The date will now be formatted as 4/13/2009, which represents the earliest date in the Join Date column where the value in the corresponding cell of the Team column is equal to Rockets:
Example 2: Find Earliest Date Based on Multiple Criteria in Excel
Suppose we would like to find the earliest date among players who are on the Mavs team and have a position of Forward.
We can specify these criteria in cells F1 and F2 and then type the following formula into cell F3 to find the earliest date:
=MINIFS(C2:C13, A2:A13, F1, B2:B13, F2)
The following screenshot shows how to use this formula in practice:
The formula returns 1/4/2019, which represents the earliest date in the Join Date column where the value in the corresponding cell of the Team column is equal to Mavs and the corresponding cell in the Position column is equal to Forward.