Custom dates in excel

What is a date in Excel?

A date is a number! And like any number (currency, percentage, decimal, …), you can customize your date format 👍

Dates are whole numbers

Usually, when you insert a date in a cell it is displayed in the format dd/mm/yyyy or mm/dd/yyyy.

Let’s say you have the date 01/01/2016 in a cell. If you change the cell’s format to Standard, the cell displays 42370 😕🤔

Explanation of the numbering

In Excel, a date is the number of days since 01/01/1900 (the first date in Excel).

So 42370 is the number of days between 01/01/1900 and 01/01/2016.

Date format

Dates can be displayed in different ways using the following 2 options (available in the Number Format dropdown in the main menu):

• Short Date
• Long Date

How to customize a date?

To customize a date:

1. Open the dialog box Custom Number (with the shortcut Ctrl + 1 or by clicking on the menu More number formats at the bottom of the number format dropdown)

1. In this dialog box, you select ‘Custom‘ in the Category list and write the date format code in ‘Type‘.

To format a date, you just write the parameter d, m or y a different number of times. For example,

• dd/mm/yyyy will display 01/01/2016
• dd mmm yyyy => 01 Jan 2016
• mmmm yyyy => January 2016
• dddd dd => Friday 01

In function of your language , the letter could be different:

• t for «tag» (day) in German
• j for «jour» (day) in French
• a for «año» (year) in Spanish

Don’t write text in your cell !!!

With dates, one of the most common mistakes is to write text inside the format code (1 January 2016 for example). Never do this in Excel ⛔⛔⛔

If you do this, the contents of the cell will be Text and not a number

• In Excel, text is always displayed on the left of a cell.
• A number or a date is displayed on the right.

If you want to display the month in letters, just change the month format of your date.

Different examples of custom date

The following document shows you the same date but in different formats. The code for each date is in column A.

Different writing of dates according to the format code

In the following document, you can see the impact of each format on the same date.

Even though dates and time are actually stored as a regular number known as the date serial number, we can make use of extensive Excel date and time formatting options to display them just the way we want.

We can access some quick date and time formats from the Home tab > in the Number group:

We can also create our own custom date and time formats to suit our needs. Let’s take a look.

1. Select the cell(s) containing the dates you want to format.
2. Press CTRL+1, or right-click > Format Cells to open the Format Cells dialog box.
3. On the Number tab select ‘Date’ in the Categories list. This brings up a list of default date formats you can select from in the ‘Type’ list. Likewise for the Time category.

We aren’t limited to the defaults though. You can create your own Custom date or time formats in the ‘Custom’ category. These custom formats are saved for you to re-use in the current file.

Custom Date Formatting Characters

Excel recognises the following characters and sets of characters for date formatting.

Custom Date Formatting Examples

We can bring the characters together to create our own custom formats. Some examples below:

Remember; the custom format doesn’t alter the underlying date serial number, it is still the same.

Custom Time Formatting Characters

Like dates, time also has its own set of custom formatting characters, as listed below:

*Note: The m or mm code must appear immediately after the h or hh code or immediately before the ss code; otherwise, Excel displays the month instead of minutes.

Custom Time Formatting Examples

Note: if your PC region settings have the Date & Time formats set to show the Short Time as hh:mm tt or the Long Time as hh:mm:ss tt then this may override any single ‘h’ formats and display them as ‘hh’.

The screenshot above is what I see with my PC region settings for the Short Time as h:mm tt. If you see something different when using a single ‘h’ format, then it will be down to your PC region settings.

More Excel Formatting

Custom cell formatting isn’t limited to dates and times. There is a plethora of formatting options for all types of numbers that we can use to get our reports looking just the way we want. Click here for our comprehensive guide to Excel custom number formatting.

Free eBook — Working with Date & Time in Excel

Everything you need to know about Date and Time in Excel — Download the free eBook and Excel file with detailed instructions.

You are not limited to using Excel’s built-in date formats. You can create your desired custom date formats in more than one way. You can even display your dates in a different language, change the appearance and order in which your dates are shown, add display color, and much more. In this article, you can learn how to format dates using a built-in format and how to format dates with use of the TEXT() function.

Using the DATE function available in Microsoft Excel is pretty simple as the function itself is very intuitive and self-explanatory. This function requires several variables to work, such as year, month and day, which can be inserted directly or entered as references to other cells with these variables. The Date function has the following syntax: DATE( year, month, day ). I have used the DATE function in many of my Calendars Templates, Project Gantt Chart, etc.

The DATE function can be used as a part of other functions or custom formulas and can also use other functions within for entering required variables. For example, one of the commonly used together with DATE functions is TODAY(), which returns the current date and can be used inside the DATE function and make it more dynamic.

The question that I have often been asked is how to format dates in the cell to display dates in alphanumerical format? Another issue is how to format dates using the TEXT() function? Additionally, why the date that is shown is either partly correct or displaying error when the spreadsheet is used in the non-English version of Microsoft Excel?

Examples

To follow along and see the examples described on this page in action, download the Excel file below.
Download the Example File (custom-date-formats.xlsx)

Change the Date Appearance with Format Cells Option

There a few methods in which you can approach these problems. The first method applies to scenarios where the content of the cell has to be displayed in some specific way, or you want to enter custom formatting. You can easily format the cell to show the date the way you need by following these steps:

1. Select the cell (or multiple cells) you want to format
2. Right-click on a cell (or cells) and select “Format Cells…” or use Ctrl+1 shortcut
3. In the Format Cells dialog box choose the Date from the categories on the left
4. Using the Locale drop-down list, choose a country or region of the date format you want to use
5. Choose the desired format type in the Type section, then click OK to apply the format

The steps to apply custom formatting to the date entered into a cell or multiple cells are very similar.

1. Select the cell (or multiple cells) you want to format
2. Right-click on a cell (or cells) and select “Format Cells…” or use Ctrl+1 shortcut
3. In the Format Cells window choose Custom from the categories on the left
4. Select the desired formatting from the list in the Type section or enter your custom format type

I won’t go through all custom formatting types that can be entered here as there are quite a few of them and it is quite frankly outside the scope of this article, but I will briefly touch upon the few of them. If you want to learn about all possible formatting types that you can create in Excel, please let me know in the comments below.

Here are some Date Format examples:

You can enter your custom format type by clicking in the area as shown on the image above. For example, if you want to display the date as November 16, 2018, you would enter the following: mmmm dd, yyyy. Check the table below for more date format options.

In this table, you can view some examples that you can apply to change the appearance of the date in the cell.

Additionally, the date can also appear in a different language by applying the language code to your formatting. For example, if you use the following language code [$-413] for Dutch, your date will appear in the Dutch language despite the system language settings of your computer. Language format can come in very handy, especially for use in spreadsheets where you want to display dates in various languages. I have posted the table with all applicable language codes at the bottom of this article.

All custom formatting applied via Excel built-in cell format option can be overwritten by conditional formatting or by accidental changes.

Format Dates with TEXT Function in Excel

If you are using the TEXT() function in your spreadsheet as a part of a formula or on its own, for applying a custom format to the date output, you can set the desired format right within the TEXT() function. To instruct the TEXT() function, you can use the same code that I have provided in the table above.

 =TEXT(A1,"mmmm d, yyyy") 

The formula above assumes that the date is in A1 (9/10/2018). The TEXT() function will apply the specified format to its output regardless of the initial format of the A1. So you should end up with the following output: September 9, 2018.

The output of the TEXT() function with a specified format cannot be changed with conditional formatting, which could sometimes be very useful. For example, you may not want to allow any system changes to override the format of your spreadsheet, such as system language changes. TEXT() function provides the ability to lock your set formats and can, to some extent prevent changes in the output.

One of many pros of using TEXT() function for setting a format of the date is the ability to set the different language for the output. You do this by including the language code with brackets to the format string, as shown in the example below

 =TEXT(A1,"[$-C0A]mmmm d, yyyy") 

Besides, you can make the TEXT() function even more dynamic by taking format string out of the worksheet function and placing it into any cell, then reference that cell in the format portion of the TEXT() function. Now you can change the format of the date by modifying the format string in the cell, without altering the TEXT() function.

 =TEXT(A1,C2) 

The formula in the example above assumes that A1 contains date and C2 includes the desired format string. The output of the TEXT() function will change every time you modify the format string in C2.

Custom Date Formats for Chart Labels and Axes

As with almost everything else in Excel, few different methods can be used to apply a custom format to the dates in the chart axes and labels. The first method is to add the custom date format from the Format Axis pane. You should notice that the Linked to source box is unchecked.

You can also follow the other methods to add a custom format to the date. For example, you can modify the format of the data source first then apply this format to your chart axis by checking the Link to source box in Format Axis pane.

Any formats applied with TEXT() function to the data source whether in cells or chart axes, cannot be overridden.

Custom Location Codes for Dates

The table below includes all custom location codes for dates. You can use these location codes at the beginning of the format code string in square brackets for displaying month names and weekday names in other languages. The location/language code contains either three or four digits and/or letters, but if the leading digit is a zero, you do not need to include it.

Other Notes about Custom Date Formats

You can quickly delete any custom formats created with built-in Format Cells option. To do so, open the Format Cells dialog box, select Custom from the categories on the left, select the custom format from the list then click Delete then click OK. All values that use the custom format which you want to delete will revert to the General format.

All custom date formats that you create belong to the workbook in which they were created. You will have to recreate the custom formats again in the new workbook or copy/paste the formatting from the file where you have initially created them. You can achieve this by copying and pasting the formatted cell, by copying the format code and pasting this code into the Format Cells dialog box or by using the Format Painter tool.

References

• Excel Custom Number Format by Mynda Treacy, Excel MVP (MyOnlineTrainingHub.com)
• Excel TEXT Function by Dave and Lisa Bruns (ExcelJet.net)

Date formatting is very important when you prepare any set of data, then there are different types of formatting used for different categories, which are different from our normal formatting which is dd/mm/yyyy. When you enter any date in MS-Excel then excel considers it as the default format of date as your computer has, but you can change their format in numerous ways, and also you can make your own custom format of a date. Such as 14-Dec, December 14, 2023, 14/12/2023, and may more depending on individual choices, you can change it. 

Here we are going to show the different ways to format a Date. Let’s understand it in a better way by taking an example, 

Step 1:  Open MS Excel and save with any name. Here we are going to save it by “Date Format” name.

Step 2: Take any date, like here we are taking 15/04/2001, which is in the format of mm-dd-yyyy and also it is the normal format of a date. 

Step 3: You can change the format by selecting that particular date cell, and press ctrl+1, then a new “format cells” window will open.

From this format window, you can choose date formatting according to your needs. If you want that date to be on 15 April 2001 format, then choose dd month yyyy from the format cell.

There are different examples of date formatting, here we are going to show you some of them.

Example 1: If you want to format the date in the dd-m-yy format then choose that option from the format cell., like shown in the below-mentioned image. 

Here you can see the outcome i.e.,15-4-01. 

Example 2: If you want to format the date in dd.m.yy format, then choose the option which is shown in mentioned below image.

Here you can see the outcome i.e.,15.4.01.

Example 3: If you want to format the date in Day, dd month, yyyy then choose the option from Format cell shown in the below-mentioned image.

Here we can see it shows day and date as well i.e., Sunday, 15 April, 2001.

Custom formatting on dates

So, here we are done with all the pre-defined formatting which are present in excel, but now we will learn Custom formatting on dates, in which we can make our own format also.

For “Custom Formatting”. Select the date. Press ctrl + 1. Choose “Custom” option. Write your own formatting in “Type” option. Then press OK.

Suppose here in custom formatting, we want to format the date in “dd-mm-yyyy-dd-mm” format now the date comes in that format only.

So here you can see the date is in dd-mm-yyyy-dd-mm format i.e.,15-04-2001-15-04.

Have you ever wondered how to display dates in a way other than the standard dd/mm/yyyy format?

What about Wednesday, 2 December 2020?

Or just December 2020?

In addition to the standard date formats, you can create your own custom date formats to fit the purpose exactly. That’s what thus post is about.

1.  Different ways of showing the date

When you think about the different ways you can display a date, there’s quite a few standard options. Here’s a sample:

2. Which date format is best?

That really comes down to the context in which the date is being used.

3. Choose a standard date format

4. Custom date format: Get down with the cool kids!

You create a custom date format by using a system of placeholders.

There are 3 primary date placeholders —

but the magic happens in how you use them.

5. Placeholder Descriptions

Here’s some examples of date formats that you can create that do not appear in the regular list. All of these example use the date 2 Dec 2014.

6. Create a formula to generate a custom date format

=TEXT(A1, «dddd, dd mmmm yyyy»)

7. What next?