So it’s best to copy and paste values only. With regular copy-paste, it also copied the formatting from the copied cells. ![]() You will have to make that data entry again.Īlso, keep in mind that cell formatting can change in case you copy and paste some data to these cells. In this example, while I changed the cell formatting first before entering the data, you can also do this with cells that already have data in them.īut remember that if you already had entered numbers that were changed by Excel (such as removing leading zeros or changing text to dates), that won’t come back. This means that Excel would not automatically change the text you enter (such as truncating the leading zeros or converting entered numbers into dates) Now, if you enter any number or any text string in these cells, it would automatically be considered as a text string. The above steps would change the default formatting of the cells from General to Text. So if you want to enter 001, enter ‘001 (where there is an apostrophe before the number).Īnd don’t worry, the apostrophe is not visible in the cell. If you manually entering data in Excel and you don’t want your numbers to change the format automatically, here is a simple trick: Not all these methods are the same and some would be more suitable than others depending on your situation. In this section, I will cover four different ways you can use to convert numbers to text in Excel. Also read: How to Write Scientific Notation in Excel? Convert Numbers to Text in Excel Now, let’s go ahead and have a look at some of the methods you can use to convert numbers to text in Excel. So if you enter anything that is a valid date format in Excel, it would be converted to a date.Ī lot of people reach out to me for this as they want to enter scores in Excel in this format, but end up getting frustrated when they see dates instead.Īgain, changing the format of the cell from number to text will help keep the scores as is. Try entering 01-01 in Excel and it will automatically change it to date (01 January of the current year). This one erk a lot of people (including myself). ![]() It just changes the digits to 0 after the 15th digit.Īgain, this is something that is taken care of if you convert the number to text. So if you are working with SSN, account numbers, or any other type of large numbers, there is a possibility that your input data is automatically being changed by Excel.Īnd what’s even worse is that you don’t get any prompt or error. Entering Large Numeric Valuesĭo you know that you can only enter a numeric value that is 15 digits long in Excel? If you enter a 16 digit long number, it will change the 16th digit to 0. One common scenario where you might need this is when you’re working with large numbers – such as SSN or employee ids that have leading zeros. This way, you get exactly what you enter. While this is not an issue in most cases (as you wouldn’t leading zeros), in case you do need these then one of the solutions is to convert these numbers to text. Keeping Leading Zerosįor example, if you enter 001 in a cell in Excel, you will notice that Excel automatically removes the leading zeros (as it thinks these are unnecessary). Lets look at a couple of scenarios where having numbers creates issues for the users. But in some cases, having a number could actually be a problem. If you need to strip extra spaces or other non-printing characters, see the TRIM and CLEAN functions.įinally, the SUBSTITUTE function will let you remove characters with "search and replace" type functionality.When working with numbers in Excel, it’s best to keep these as numbers only. You can also use the MID function in more complicated situations. The formulas in C8 and C9 show how to use the LEFT and RIGHT functions to strip non-numeric characters from a text value before it's converted to a number. If a cell contains non-numeric characters like dashes, punctuation, and so on, you'll need to remove those characters before you can convert to numbers. In the example shown, C7 uses this formula. ![]() This has the same functionality as VALUE above. This forces Excel to try and convert the text value to a number to handle the math operation. Add zero insteadĪnother common trick is to simply add zero to the text value with a formula like this: =A1+0 If it doesn't work, you'll get a #VALUE error. In simple cases, it will just work and you'll get a numeric result. The VALUE function will try to "coerce" a number stored as text to a true number. This means if you try to SUM column A, you'll get a result of zero. In this example, the values in column A are "stored as text".
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