EXACT in WPS Spreadsheet: Compare Case-Sensitive Text and Review Mismatches

• Introduced: documented by 2019-05-13 in the official WPS lesson; original introduction is not established.
• Availability: WPS Office for Windows Personal; WPS 2019 explicitly named in the lesson. This is documentation evidence, not an installed-build guarantee.
• Scope: the exact supported build range is unverified. The cited Windows lesson does not establish equivalent availability in other WPS clients.
• Checked: October 14, 2026 against the function-specific lesson and vendor catalogue. Examples were independently calculated; no new native WPS test was performed.

=EXACT(text1, text2)

Both arguments are required. They can be text literals in double quotes or references to cells containing the strings. Use EXACT for text identity checks, not for comparing font color, number format or a cell’s entire workbook context.

The examples use text identifiers. Numeric conversion, date formatting and mixed data types can introduce separate questions, so retain text inputs when the spelling of an identifier is what matters.

Enter A1:B6:

In C2 enter and fill down:

=EXACT(A2,B2)

Expected C2:C6: TRUE, FALSE, FALSE, TRUE, FALSE.

Row 3 differs only in letter case. Row 4 has an underscore rather than a hyphen. Row 6 contains an extra internal space. EXACT does not decide which spelling is correct; it identifies whether the two supplied strings match.

Put Depot in E2 and F2. Format E2 in bold and F2 in italics, without editing their text.

=EXACT(E2,F2)

Expected result: TRUE. The official lesson explicitly distinguishes text identity from formatting differences. Changing F2’s contents to DEPOT makes the expected result FALSE, even if both cells use the same font and color.

This also explains why EXACT is not a formatting-audit tool. A TRUE result cannot confirm matching borders, fill colors, alignment or displayed number formats.

These direct tests are easy to reproduce:

The last row compares two explicit empty strings. It does not make a broader claim that all blank cells, numeric zeros and missing values are interchangeable.

Create a second comparison column beside the first dataset:

=EXACT(LOWER(A2),LOWER(B2))

Expected results when filled down: TRUE, TRUE, FALSE, TRUE, FALSE. LOWER makes both strings lowercase before EXACT compares them.

Row 3 now matches after normalization, while rows 4 and 6 still differ. A useful review process records both columns: exact identity and identity after an explicitly approved transformation. Do not replace a strict comparison with a normalized one merely to make every record pass.

For a readable status from the original case-sensitive check:

=IF(EXACT(A2,B2),"Match","Review")

Expected statuses: Match, Review, Review, Match, Review.

When a result looks wrong, compare the lengths with LEN and inspect the original strings. A trailing space or different punctuation can be easy to miss. Do not apply TRIM unless trimming is permitted by the field’s rules; an exact match after cleanup is a different question from an exact match before cleanup.

Keep both source columns. A mismatch is a review signal, not an instruction to overwrite either value. If text came from an external system, confirm which source is authoritative and whether case is meaningful there.

This guide uses straightforward ASCII comparisons and does not claim a particular Unicode normalization policy for every WPS release. Visually similar composed characters require native checks in the actual workbook environment. No comparison formula can establish that two differently spelled real-world names refer to the same person without other evidence.

• Official WPS EXACT lesson, published 2019-05-13 (Chinese; Windows Personal scope).
• WPS EXACT documentation catalogue.

The lesson establishes the function-specific behavior discussed here. The catalogue confirms its listed identity, not an exact current build range. Expected outputs use original examples checked independently; native execution and broader client compatibility remain unverified.