Replacing Characters at the End of a Cell

Sam has a large number of addresses in a worksheet. In those addresses he needs to make sure that all compass directions (NE, SE, NW, and SW) are all uppercase. It would be very helpful if Sam could figure out how to change any of these lowercase (or mixed case) directions that appear only at the end of a cell with their uppercase counterparts. He can't just search for a space followed by "ne", as that would change Newton to NEwton, so he wonders how he can make sure that the replacement occurs only when the letters appear at the end of a cell.

There is no way to accomplish this task using the Find and Replace tools in Excel. That means that you need to use a formula or a macro to do the task. Formulas can be used to make sure that the last two characters of a cell are uppercase:

=LEFT(A1,LEN(A1)-2) & UPPER(RIGHT(A1,2))

The problem with such a formula, however, is that it is non-discriminating. As long as any cell it is used on has a compass direction as its last two characters, there is no problem. But if some cells don't have the compass direction, then you run into problems real fast. In that case you need to actually have the formula check the last characters:

=IF(RIGHT(A1,3)=" ne", LEFT(A1,LEN(A1)-2) & "NE",
IF(RIGHT(A1,3)=" se", LEFT(A1,LEN(A1)-2) & "SE",
IF(RIGHT(A1,3)=" nw", LEFT(A1,LEN(A1)-2) & "NW",
IF(RIGHT(A1,3)=" sw", LEFT(A1,LEN(A1)-2) & "SW", A1))))

This formula checks the last three characters to see if there is a space followed by either ne, se, nw, or sw. If this is the case, then those last two characters are made uppercase. The formula can be shortened if you approach it differently:

=IF(OR(RIGHT(A1,3)=" ne", RIGHT(A1,3)=" se", RIGHT(A1,3)=" nw",
RIGHT(A1,3)=" sw"), LEFT(A1,LEN(A1)-2) & UPPER(RIGHT(A1,2)), A1)

You can shorten it even more by using an array of compass directions in the formula:

=IF(OR(RIGHT(A1,3)={" ne"," se"," sw"," nw"}),
LEFT(A1,LEN(A1)-2) & UPPER(RIGHT(A1,2)), A1)

If you prefer to not use a formula, you can easily create a macro that will do the checking and conversion for you:

Sub CapDirections1()
    Dim C As Range

    For Each C In Selection
        CText = UCase(Right(C, 3))
        If CText = " NE" Or CText = " SE" _
          Or CText = " SW" Or CText = " NW" Then
            C = Left(C, Len(C) - 3) & CText
        End If
    Next
End Sub

To use the macro, just select the cells containing the addresses, and then run it. It checks to see if one of the four compass points are at the end of the cell value, and if it is then it makes sure that the compass direction is uppercase.

You could shorten the macro somewhat by combining the compass directions in a string and then checking against that:

Sub CapDirections2()
    Dim C As Range

    For Each C In Selection
        C = Trim(C)
        If InStr(" ne se sw nw", Right(C, 3)) Then
            C = Replace(C, Right(C, 2), UCase(Right(C, 2)))
        End If
    Next C
End Sub

The macro uses InStr to determine if the rightmost 3 characters in the cell are equal to one of the four compass directions. If so, then Replace function is used to uppercase the two rightmost characters in the cell.

You should note that these solutions are based upon there only being four possible compass directions in your addresses. If your addresses have more wide-ranging compass directions (like N or SSE) then you will definitely want to use a macro-based solution because the checking quickly becomes very complex for a formula. Here, for example, is a macro-based solution that looks at sixteen possible compass directions:

Sub CapDirections3()
    Dim C As Range
    Dim sComp() As String
    Dim sText As String
    Dim sTemp As String
    Dim J As Integer
    Dim K As Integer

    sComp = Split("N NNE NE ENE E ESE SE SSE S SSW SW WSW W WNW NW NNW")

    For Each C In Selection.SpecialCells(xlCellTypeConstants, xlTextValues)
        sText = RTrim(C)
        J = InStrRev(sText, " ")
        sTemp = UCase(Replace(Mid(sText, J), "-", ""))
        For K = 0 To 15
            If sTemp = sComp(K) Then
                C = Left(sText, J) & sTemp
                Exit For
            End If
        Next K
    Next C
End Sub

This macro is quite a bit more robust than the earlier ones. It puts the 16 compass directions into an array (sComp) and then starts stepping through the selected cells. In this case, it only looks at those cells that contain text values. The value of the cell is placed into sText, and the last location of a space in sText is determined (J). Any dashes in that trailing portion of the string are then removed. (This is done in case someone entered the directions such as N-E or W-S-W.)

The macro then checks each of the 16 compass directions to see if it matches what was pulled from the end of the cell value (sTemp). If there is a match, then the updated address is stuffed back into the cell.

ExcelTips is your source for cost-effective Microsoft Excel training. This tip (9746) applies to Microsoft Excel 2007, 2010, 2013, 2016, 2019, 2021, 2024, and Excel in Microsoft 365. You can find a version of this tip for the older menu interface of Excel here: Replacing Characters at the End of a Cell.