Please Note: This article is written for users of the following Microsoft Excel versions: 2007, 2010, 2013, 2016, 2019, 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: How Excel Stores Dates and Times.
Written by Allen Wyatt (last updated March 13, 2021)
This tip applies to Excel 2007, 2010, 2013, 2016, 2019, and Excel in Microsoft 365
Internally, Excel stores a date or time as a number. The whole part of the number (the part to the left of the decimal point) represents the number of days starting with an arbitrary starting point (typically January 1, 1900). The decimal portion (the part to the right of the decimal point) represents the time for that date. These internal representations of dates and times are often referred to as serial numbers.
To see how this works, enter the number 23 in a cell. If you have not previously formatted the cell, Excel uses the General format, displaying the number simply as 23. If you later format this cell using a date format—m/d/yy, for instance—Excel changes the display to 1/23/00, or January 23, 1900. (January 1, 1900, is 1; January 2 is 2; January 3 is 3; and so on.)
The portion to the right of the decimal point represents a fractional portion of a day. Thus, a single second would be equal to approximately 0.00001157407, since that is equal to 1 (a day) divided by 86,400 (the number of seconds in a day).
Since Excel stores dates and times as serial numbers, you can do math on them. For instance, if you wanted to determine the number of days between two dates, or the amount of time between two times, simply subtract them from each other. The result is the number of days and fractions of days between the two.
ExcelTips is your source for cost-effective Microsoft Excel training. This tip (11337) applies to Microsoft Excel 2007, 2010, 2013, 2016, 2019, and Excel in Microsoft 365. You can find a version of this tip for the older menu interface of Excel here: How Excel Stores Dates and Times.
Comprehensive VBA Guide Visual Basic for Applications (VBA) is the language used for writing macros in all Office programs. This complete guide shows both professionals and novices how to master VBA in order to customize the entire Office suite for their needs. Check out Mastering VBA for Office 2010 today!
One of the many pieces of information that Excel keeps track of is your name. If you want to change your name for Excel's ...
Discover MoreHate to take your fingers off the keyboard? Here's how you can move from worksheet to worksheet without touching the mouse.
Discover MoreNeed to find out how good you are with Excel? Here are some places you can check out to quiz yourself.
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 © 2024 Sharon Parq Associates, Inc.
Comments