Excel is a powerful tool that enables you to organize vast amounts of data with great ease. However, if the data you are working with contains dates and they are in text format, it may not be possible to perform certain calculations or filters. In such cases, you would need to convert the text into a date format. Here is a guide on how to convert text to date format in Excel.

Step 1: Check the Text Format

Before you begin converting the text to date format, you need to check the existing format of the text. To do this, select the column of data to be converted, then navigate to the ‘Home’ tab, and click on the ‘Number Format’ drop-down menu.

If you find that the cells are already formatted as a date but are still displayed as text, you can skip the next step. However, if the cells are not formatted as a date, you need to proceed to step 2.

Step 2: Convert the Text to Date

To convert text to a date in Excel, you can use the ‘Datevalue’ function. This function converts a da

First, create a new column next to the column of data to be converted. Click on the cell in the first row of the new column, and enter the ‘=DATEVALUE’ formula followed by the cell number of the text date in quotation marks. The formula should look something like this: =DATEVALUE(“A1”)

Then, press ‘Enter,’ and Excel will return the date in the date format and not the text format. To copy the formula to the rest of the cells in the column, hover your cursor over the bottom right corner of the cell until it changes to a black plus sign, then click and drag the formula down the column.

Step 3: Format the Date

Once you have converted the text to a date format, you can apply the appropriate date formatting to improve readability. To do this, select the column containing the date data, navigate to the ‘Home’ tab, and click on ‘Number Format.’ Choose the date format that you prefer.

You can now work with the date data as required, such as filtering for specific ranges of dates or performing calculations based on time intervals.