Why does this formula take so long???

[JamesBowdidge]

=Countif($a$2:$a$150000,a2)

So when copied down in B and pressing F9 takes litterally 10-15 mins to calculate..

I have used this before and it didnt take this long?

any suggestions as to why? or an alternative to achieve the same result?

thanks

J

 

[steve the fish]

A pivot table on column A can give a count of each item in A then do a vlookup on the pivot table based on A2, A3 etc.