Excel vba worksheetfunction trim

This tutorial will demonstrate how to use the Trim, LTrim, and RTrim VBA functions as well as the Trim worksheet function.

Trim Function

The VBA Trim function removes (“trims”) erroneous spaces before and after strings of text.

Trim Spaces Before and After Text

The VBA Trim function will remove spaces before and after strings of text:

Sub TrimExample_1()
MsgBox Trim(" I love excel ")		
'Result is: "I love excel"

MsgBox Trim(" I love excel")		
'Result is: "I love excel"

MsgBox Trim("I love excel ")		
'Result is: "I love excel"
End Sub

Trim Multiple Spaces Before and After Text

This includes trimming multiple spaces before and after text:

Sub TrimExample_2()
MsgBox Trim("     I love excel          ")		
'Result is: "I love excel"

MsgBox Trim("      I love excel")			
'Result is: "I love excel"

MsgBox Trim("I love excel             ")		
'Result is: "I love excel"
End Sub

VBA Trim will NOT Remove Multiple Spaces Between Words

However, the Trim function will not remove multiple spaces in between words:

Sub TrimExample_3()
MsgBox Trim("     I love    excel          ")		
'Result is: "I love    excel"

MsgBox Trim("      I  love excel")			
'Result is: "I  love excel"

MsgBox Trim("I love        excel             ")		
'Result is: "I love        excel"
End Sub

Trim as a Worksheet Function

However, the Excel Trim worksheet function can be used to remove extra spaces between words:

Use Worksheet Trim Function in VBA

To use the Excel Trim Function in VBA, call it by using WorksheetFunction:

Sub TrimExample_4()
Msgbox WorksheetFunction.Trim("     I love    excel          ")	
'Result is: "I love excel"

Msgbox WorksheetFunction.Trim("      I  love excel")		
'Result is: "I love excel"

Msgbox WorksheetFunction.Trim("I love        excel             ")	
'Result is: "I love excel"
End Sub

Difference Between WorksheetFunction.Trim and VBA Trim

This will demonstrate the differences between Trim and WorksheetFunction.Trim:

Sub TrimExample_5()
Msgbox WorksheetFunction.Trim("     I love    excel          ")	
'Result is: "I love excel"
Msgbox Trim("     I love    excel          ")				
'Result is: "I love    excel"

Msgbox WorksheetFunction.Trim("      I  love excel")		
'Result is: "I love excel"
Msgbox Trim("      I  love excel")					
'Result is: "I  love excel"

Msgbox WorksheetFunction.Trim("I love        excel             ")	
'Result is: "I love excel"
Msgbox Trim("I love        excel             ")				
'Result is: "I love        excel"

End Sub

Use VBA to add Trim Function in a Range

The Trim Worksheet function can be added in a Range using property .Formula:

Sub TrimExample_6()
ThisWorkbook.Worksheets("Sheet1").Range("B1").Formula = "=trim(A1)"		
End Sub

LTrim Function

The LTrim function removes spaces only from the left side of the word:

Sub TrimExample_7()
MsgBox LTrim(" I love excel ")			
'Result is: "I love excel "

MsgBox LTrim(" I love excel")			
'Result is: "I love excel"

MsgBox LTrim("I love excel ")			
'Result is: "I love excel "

MsgBox LTrim("   I love   excel   ")		
'Result is: "I love   excel   "

MsgBox LTrim("   I   love excel")			
'Result is: "I   love excel"

MsgBox LTrim("I love    excel   ")			
'Result is: "I love    excel    "
End Sub

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RTrim Function

The RTrim function removes spaces only from the right side of the word:

Sub TrimExample_8()
MsgBox RTrim(" I love excel ")			
'Result is: " I love excel"

MsgBox RTrim(" I love excel")			
'Result is: " I love excel"

MsgBox RTrim("I love excel ")			
'Result is: "I love excel"

MsgBox RTrim("   I love   excel   ")		
'Result is: "   I love   excel"

MsgBox RTrim("    I    love excel")		
'Result is: "    I    love excel"

MsgBox RTrim("I    love excel    ")		
'Result is: "I     love excel    "
End Sub

Trim, Ltrim and Rtrim do not remove spaces between words.

Remove all spaces from text

Trim will only remove extra spaces in between words, but to remove all spaces in a string of text, you can use the Replace Function:

Sub ReplaceExample ()
MsgBox Replace("     I love     excel ", " ", "")		
'Result is: "Iloveexcel"
End Sub

Excel already has a TRIM worksheet function that you can use to get rid of leading, trailing, and extra spaces in between words/strings.

There is a TRIM function in VBA as well (and it does exactly the same thing – remove extra spaces).

Why do we need a TRIM function in VBA too?

Fair question!

While you can work with the inbuilt TRIM function in Excel worksheets to get rid of spaces. in some cases, you may need to do this using VBA.

This could be as a part of a bigger code.

Syntax of the VBA TRIM function

TRIM(String)

‘String’ is the argument that can be a text string or a variable that holds a text string.

Let’s learn how to use the VBA TRIM function with a couple of examples.

Example 1 – Showing Result in a message box

Suppose you have the following text in cell A1

Note that there are spaces before and after the sentence.

The below code would take this sentence, and show the result after trimming the extra spaces

Sub TrimExample1()
MsgBox Trim(Range("A1"))
End Sub

There is one important thing to know when using the TRIM function in VBA –  it will only remove the leading and trailing spaces. It will not remove the extra spaces in between words (which the in-built TRIM function in the worksheet does).

For example, suppose you have the following text in cell A1 (with extra spaces in between words):

If I use the above VBA code, it will show a message box as shown below:

As you can see in the message box result, the extra spaces between words are not removed by the VBA TRIM function.

Then what’s the alternative?

If you want to remove leading, trailing, as well as double spaces in between words, it’s better to use the following code:

Sub TrimExample1()
MsgBox WorksheetFunction.Trim(Range("A1"))
End Sub

The above code uses the worksheet TRIM function (instead of using the TRIM function in VBA).

Note: VBA Trim function does not remove the non-whitespace characters – such as newlines (vbNewLine, vbCrLf) etc.

Example 2 – Quickly Remove Leading and Trailing Spaces from a Range of Cells

Suppose you have a data set as shown below where there are leading and trailing spaces:

You can use the below code to instantly clean this data and remove all the leading and trailing spaces:

Sub TrimExample1()
Dim Rng As Range
Set Rng = Selection
For Each Cell In Rng
Cell.Value = Trim(Cell)
Next Cell
End Sub

The above code goes through all the cells in the selection and removes the leading and trailing spaces.

You May Also Like the Following Excel/VBA Tutorials:

• 10 Ways to Clean Data in Excel.
• Excel VBA Split Function.
• Excel VBA InStr Function.
• VBA LCase Function.
• VBA UCase Function.
• Creating a User Defined Function (UDF) in Excel VBA.