Reading Excel files (read_excel) in Data Analysis Python - Practice Problems & Coding Challenges

Challenge - 5 Problems

❓ Predict Output

intermediate

What is the output of this code reading an Excel file?

Consider an Excel file named data.xlsx with a sheet named Sheet1 containing a column Age with values [25, 30, 35]. What will be the output of the following code?

Data Analysis Python

import pandas as pd

df = pd.read_excel('data.xlsx', sheet_name='Sheet1')
print(df['Age'].tolist())

A ['25', '30', '35']

B [25, 30, 35, None]

C [25, 30, 35]

D KeyError: 'Age'

💡 Hint

Think about how pandas reads numeric columns from Excel.

The code reads the Excel sheet correctly and extracts the 'Age' column as integers, so the list is [25, 30, 35].

❓ data_output

intermediate

What data is loaded with this read_excel call?

Given an Excel file sales.xlsx with sheets Q1 and Q2, each having columns Product and Sales. What will be the shape of the DataFrame loaded by this code?

Data Analysis Python

import pandas as pd

df = pd.read_excel('sales.xlsx', sheet_name='Q2')
print(df.shape)

A (10, 2)

B (2, 10)

C (0, 0)

D FileNotFoundError

💡 Hint

Assume Q2 sheet has 10 rows and 2 columns.

The DataFrame shape is (10, 2) because Q2 sheet has 10 rows and 2 columns.

🔧 Debug

advanced

What error does this code raise when reading an Excel file?

What error will this code produce if the file missing.xlsx does not exist in the folder?

Data Analysis Python

import pandas as pd

df = pd.read_excel('missing.xlsx')

A FileNotFoundError

B ValueError

C KeyError

D TypeError

💡 Hint

Think about what happens when a file is missing.

If the file is missing, Python raises FileNotFoundError.

🧠 Conceptual

advanced

Which option correctly reads only columns 'Name' and 'Age' from an Excel file?

You want to read only the columns 'Name' and 'Age' from people.xlsx. Which code does this correctly?

A pd.read_excel('people.xlsx', cols=['Name', 'Age'])

B pd.read_excel('people.xlsx', columns=['Name', 'Age'])

C pd.read_excel('people.xlsx', select=['Name', 'Age'])

D pd.read_excel('people.xlsx', usecols=['Name', 'Age'])

💡 Hint

Check the correct parameter name for selecting columns.

The parameter to select columns is 'usecols'. Other options are invalid.

🚀 Application

expert

What is the output of this code reading multiple sheets into a dictionary?

Given an Excel file multi_sheets.xlsx with sheets Jan and Feb, each with 3 rows and 2 columns, what will be the output of this code?

Data Analysis Python

import pandas as pd

sheets = pd.read_excel('multi_sheets.xlsx', sheet_name=['Jan', 'Feb'])
print(len(sheets), sheets['Jan'].shape, sheets['Feb'].shape)

A 2 (2, 3) (2, 3)

B 2 (3, 2) (3, 2)

C 1 (3, 2) (3, 2)

D KeyError: 'Jan'

💡 Hint

Reading multiple sheets returns a dictionary with sheet names as keys.

The variable sheets is a dict with 2 keys. Each DataFrame has shape (3, 2).