Excel 365’s Geography data type isn’t totally reliable or accurate. Looking at its results for the UK (United Kingdom) vs Great Britain is just one example of the problems you need to watch out for.
If you’re not clear on the difference between United Kingdom and Great Britain, see below.
Here’s the current results from Excel 365 for various parts of the United Kingdom plus some other islands.
It shows various issues with the information given by Excel 365’s Geography data type.
- The Geography data doesn’t understand “Great Britain” but might offer “United Kingdom” instead or (warning!), switch automatically.
- To get stats for Great Britain, get the data for England, Scotland and Wales and add them up (Row 6).
- Add the Great Britain total to Northern Ireland stats to get one version of statistics for United Kingdom (Row 8).
- OR ask Excel for United Kingdom data directly (Row 9).
As you can see, the two “United Kingdom” calculations don’t match (Row 11). Just one of the many anomalies you’ll find in the Geography data from Excel 365, caused by the system using different data sources
Maps instead of Flags
- Instead of a flag for Northern Ireland, it shows a tiny map. That’s probably because there’s no official flag for the region.
- Jersey does have a flag, but instead Excel offers a map.
- Isle of Man also has a flag but Excel has a satellite image, seemingly ripped from the Wikipedia page.
United Kingdom vs Great Britain
The names “United Kingdom”, “Great Britain” and “England” are often used interchangeably but are labels for various combinations of regions. Here’s a simple break down in Word bullet-point form:
For simplicity we’ve passed over Crown Dominions (Isle of Man, Jersey, Guernsey) and British Overseas Territories , that aren’t strictly part of the United Kingdom. See Wikipedia for a longer explanation.
See British Isles, United Kingdom etc. explained in a simple diagram
At the Olympics, the IOC refers to “Great Britain” not “United Kingdom” because athletes from Northern Ireland can choose to complete for the Republic of Ireland or “Team GB”.
Insert the British ‘Union Jack’ flag into Word, Excel or PowerPoint
Add the Irish Flag into Word, Excel or PowerPoint
