Please Note: This article is written for users of the following Microsoft Excel versions: 2007, 2010, and 2013. If you are using an earlier version (Excel 2003 or earlier), this tip may not work for you. For a version of this tip written specifically for earlier versions of Excel, click here: Formulas Don't Calculate as Formulas.
When you enter information into a cell, Excel needs to determine how to treat that information. Should it be considered a date? A number? As a formula? Perhaps it is text? Excel interprets your cell entry according to a fairly well-defined set of rules. The "fall-back" determination for a cell is to treat an entry as text.
You may notice something odd when entering information in a cell, however—Excel may always treat what you enter as text. For instance, you may enter a formula such as =B3 into a cell, with the expectation that the formula will be understood by Excel and the contents of cell B3 will be shown as a result of the formula. Excel, however, may simply display "=B3" in the cell, instead of the expected result.
If this happens to you, then Excel is not interpreting your cell entry as a formula, but as text. It is bypassing the normal parsing that goes on and instead jumping directly to the "fall-back" determination of the cell containing text.
This problem happens most often when the cell into which you are entering information was previously formatted as text. In other words, someone used the Number Format drop-down list (in the Number group on the Home tab of the ribbon) or the Format Cells dialog box to explicitly format the cell as Text.
An easy way to correct this situation is to perform the following steps:
Your formula should now be treated as a formula instead of as text.
ExcelTips is your source for cost-effective Microsoft Excel training. This tip (3308) applies to Microsoft Excel 2007, 2010, and 2013. You can find a version of this tip for the older menu interface of Excel here: Formulas Don't Calculate as Formulas.
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2017-12-08 12:45:29
brotherinjah
Very often you have to use ctrl + H and replace some common part in formulas from affected range, this will force excel to recheck changed cells and finally recognize it as formula.
2017-06-29 02:16:06
Paula
@ Malcolm,
thanks Malcolm for taking the time. I tried your suggestion and it doesn't work.
I'm thinking there's something wrong with the entire tab - giving up on this one shortly.
Thanks again!!
2017-06-28 02:55:09
Malcolm Revell
@ Paula
Paula select the cells that are formatted in txt where you want to make the formula. Click on the Home tab at the top LHS . (Next to File). Go to the RHS to the Editing tab. Click Clear/Clear All. This then allows you to use those cells you selected to put in data and makes your formula work.
2017-06-27 10:28:18
Shandor
Ron's macro works fine, and though he doesn't explicitly say so, if you select a whole column it'll work for that too.
2017-06-27 06:08:12
Surendera M. Bhanot
Check the contents of the cell containing the formula. If there is a <'> (single quote) at the beginning of the cell before '=' sign, it means the excel has been asked to read the contents as "Text". Remove that single quote and the formula will work.
2017-06-27 02:39:54
Paula
hello,
this tip did not work for me, do you have any others
thank you
2014-06-28 12:11:25
Ron
One click solution. I run into this issue all the time. I often work with worksheets that contain columns of data formatted as text. If you insert a column to the right of a text column Excel formats that column as Text also. Enter a formula there and Excel displays the text of the formula, not the result.
I use the following macro assigned to a QAT icon. Select the offending cell and click the QAT icon. Result of formula is now displayed.
Sub Format_General()
'
' Format_General Macro
'
'
Selection.NumberFormat = "General"
Selection.TextToColumns Destination:=ActiveCell, DataType:=xlDelimited, _
TextQualifier:=xlDoubleQuote, ConsecutiveDelimiter:=False, Tab:=True, _
Semicolon:=False, Comma:=False, Space:=False, Other:=False, FieldInfo _
:=Array(1, 1), TrailingMinusNumbers:=True
End Sub
2013-06-13 11:36:37
Danielle
Stuart, and all.
Pressing Ctrl+1 (U.S. keyboard) will bring up the same dialog box.
2013-06-03 15:08:49
Susan
This has also been my experience, Paul. Also - you can make calculations automatic or manual (turn automatic calculation on/off) in an Excel spreadsheet by going to "calculation options" in the "calculation" group on the ribbon under the "formulas" tab from 2010.
2013-06-03 12:47:12
Michelle Redford
Paul,
You are correct, Excel for 2010 does have the option to turn on/off auto calculation. If you go to the fomula tab and look in the Calculation box, there is a drop down for calculation options, and one of the selections is Automatic. Hope that solves the mystery for you!!!
2013-06-02 08:13:28
Joe Marten
I use Alt+AEF
2013-06-01 11:50:42
Ed
If my formula is a macro, how do you make it auto calculate?
2013-06-01 08:58:49
stuart
can you not just press ctrl shift ~ (uk keyboard)
2013-06-01 06:43:31
Ronald Palmer
When this happens to me, I select the range and format as general.
2013-06-01 06:15:43
Paul
in older versions of Excel there used to be an option in 'Tools/Options' to turn off automatic calculation. You turn it on/off with the F9 key.
Now so far I haven't found this option in the newer versions but knowing Excel I bet it is there somewhere.
The point of course being that in this case automatic calculation may be turned off.
From my experience this used to happen either when Spread Sheets got very large and unwieldy or when there were some Macros floating around with values that were formula dependent
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Please Note:
This article is written for users of the following Microsoft Excel versions: 2007, 2010, and 2013. If you are using an earlier version (Excel 2003 or earlier), this tip may not work for you. For a version of this tip written specifically for earlier versions of Excel, click here: 
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