How to Convert Date to Text in Excel? (Top 4 Ways)

How to Convert Date to Text in Excel?

The conversion of the date to text is very easy and simple. There are four simple ways to convert date to text in Excel:

Using the Text Function (most commonly used)
Using the Text to Column option
Using Copy Paste method
Using VBA

Use of Date to Text in Worksheet

In Excel Text function is commonly used to convert a numeric value to a text string and display it in the format you specify so we can use it to convert date to text in excel format.

Date to Text Function in Excel

The TEXT formula in excel is as follows:

Value: It is a numeric value you want to convert to text. This can be a number, a formula that returns a numeric value, or a reference to a cell containing a number.
format_text: This is how you want to format the resulting text value, provided as a text string enclosed in quotation marks.

Using the Text function to convert date to text in excel requires a basic understanding of the formats that you can use in it.

In the case of dates, there are four parts to the format:

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You can download this Convert Date to Text Excel Template here – Convert Date to Text Excel Template

#1 Using Text Function

Example #1

Apply the formula =A4&”‘s joining date is “&TEXT(B4,”dd-mm-yyyy”)

To get the below output.

Example #2

You can also convert the current date to text by below formula

=”Today is “&TEXT(TODAY(),”dd/mm/yyyy”)

To get the below output.

#2 Using Text to Column

Suppose you have a dataset as shown in the below and you want to convert these dates into text format:

Select the data and Go to Data then Data Tools and Text to Column in Excel.

Press Next and uncheck all Delimiters

Select the location and click on the finish as shown in the below figure.

The output will be as follows:

#3 Using Copy Paste Method

Consider the data set of joining date

Copy the data. Open a Notepad and paste it there. As soon as you paste the dates in the notepad, it automatically gets converted into text.
Now switch back to the Excel and select the cells where you want to paste these dates.
With the cells selected, go to Home then Number and select the Text format (from the drop down).
Paste the date as text

#4 Using VBA

Suppose we have the text in the Sheet1 and in the H2 cell then apply the Date to text by using the below VBA code.

Sub Datetotexts ()

Dim c As Range

For Each c In Selection

c.Value = Format(c.Value, “dd.mm.yyyy”)

Next c

End Sub

Things to Remember

Left-aligned by default
If several text dates are selected, the Status Bar only shows Count.
There may be a leading apostrophe visible in the formula bar.

Date to Text in Excel