How to Call VBA Function from Excel Cells?

Question posted 2013 · +7 upvotes

I am a VBA newbie, and I am trying to write a function that I can call from Excel cells, that can open a workbook that’s closed, look up a cell value, and return it.

So far I know how to write a macro like this:

Sub OpenWorkbook()
    Dim path As String
    path = "C:UsersUserNameDesktopTestSample.xlsx"

    Dim currentWb As Workbook
    Set currentWb = ThisWorkbook


    currentWb.Sheets("Sheet1").Range("A1") = OpenWorkbookToPullData(path, "B2")
End Sub


Function OpenWorkbookToPullData(path, cell)

    Dim openWb As Workbook
    Set openWb = Workbooks.Open(path, , True)

    Dim openWs As Worksheet
    Set openWs = openWb.Sheets("Sheet1")

    OpenWorkbookToPullData = openWs.Range(cell)

    openWb.Close (False)

End Function

The macro OpenWorkbook() runs perfectly fine, but when I am trying to call OpenWorkbookToPullData(…) directly from an Excel cell, it doesn’t work. The statement:

    Set openWb = Workbooks.Open(path, , True)

returns Nothing.

Does anyone know how to turn it into a working VBA function that can be called from Excel cell?