Please Note: This article is written for users of the following Microsoft Excel versions: 2007, 2010, 2013, 2016, 2019, 2021, and Excel in Microsoft 365. 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: Calculating Fractions of Years.
One of the types of data that Excel allows you to store is, of course, dates. At some point you may wish to perform some calculations with the dates in your worksheet. It is not uncommon to need to figure out the percentage of a year represented by the difference between two dates. Excel allows you to calculate this easily using the YEARFRAC worksheet function.
To use the function, all you need to do is provide two dates and a value that specifies how Excel should calculate the fractional year:
=YEARFRAC(DateOne, DateTwo, Basis)
The dates used by YEARFRAC can be either static dates, or they can be references to cells that contain dates. The Basis value ranges between 0 and 4, with 0 being the default. The following are the different meanings for the Basis:
| Basis | Meaning | |
|---|---|---|
| 0 | US 30/360 | |
| 1 | Actual/actual | |
| 2 | Actual/360 | |
| 3 | Actual/365 | |
| 4 | European 30/360 |
ExcelTips is your source for cost-effective Microsoft Excel training. This tip (9366) applies to Microsoft Excel 2007, 2010, 2013, 2016, 2019, 2021, and Excel in Microsoft 365. You can find a version of this tip for the older menu interface of Excel here: Calculating Fractions of Years.
Excel Smarts for Beginners! Featuring the friendly and trusted For Dummies style, this popular guide shows beginners how to get up and running with Excel while also helping more experienced users get comfortable with the newest features. Check out Excel 2019 For Dummies today!
Excel works very well with dates and times. One thing you cannot do, however, is to create a custom format that displays ...
Discover MoreHow do you display a number of years, such as 3.67 years, as a number of years and months? It’s simple to do with a ...
Discover MoreEver wonder how to calculate the date for Thanksgiving in the United States? In this tip you discover not only that, but ...
Discover MoreFREE SERVICE: Get tips like this every week in ExcelTips, a free productivity newsletter. Enter your address and click "Subscribe."
There are currently no comments for this tip. (Be the first to leave your comment—just use the simple form above!)
Got a version of Excel that uses the ribbon interface (Excel 2007 or later)? This site is for you! If you use an earlier version of Excel, visit our ExcelTips site focusing on the menu interface.
FREE SERVICE: Get tips like this every week in ExcelTips, a free productivity newsletter. Enter your address and click "Subscribe."
Copyright © 2026 Sharon Parq Associates, Inc.
Please Note:
This article is written for users of the following Microsoft Excel versions: 2007, 2010, 2013, 2016, 2019, 2021, and Excel in Microsoft 365. 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: 
Comments