excel len function not working

Below is an example where I have the marks data for some students and I want to extract marks in Exam 1 for the students in the table on the right. For example, to get the length of cell A2, you use this formula: =LEN (A2) As shown in the below screenshot, our LEN formula counted 36 characters including 29 letters, 1 . It is also an inbuilt function that can be accessed by typing =LEN( and providing a string as input. We can use the LEN function to count the number of characters in a cell, excluding all spaces. So, what has happened here is that you get the correct result from LEN(), but then you have formatted this result to be interpreted as a date. In case you know of any other reason (maybe something that irks you often), let me know in the comments section. This example uses the Right function to return a specified number of characters from the right side of a string. Why don't we use the 7805 for car phone chargers? The cell with your LEN formula is formatted as text. LEN function considers special characters, spaces, and alphabets and counts all these values if a selected cell exists. I tried to change bothe columns into "number" format but still the problem persisted. Let us now see how to use the LEN function in Excel with the help of some examples. Here we discuss the LEN Formula and how to use the LEN function in Excel, along with practical examples and downloadable Excel templates. For a better experience, please enable JavaScript in your browser before proceeding. A lot of people add an apostrophe to convert formulas and numbers to text. Making the text color match the background color works but is problematic with striped rows. Will be saving this & referring back in the future I'm sure. Note: The above steps would only work for data entered after the formatting has been changed. As I said, the formula is not giving the wrong result. Dim FileExists As Boolean FileExists = Dir ("D:\myfile" & "*.txt") <> "" If FileExists Then MsgBox "File found in M:" Share Improve this answer Follow answered Mar 1, 2014 at 1:12 Santosh 12.1k 4 41 72 Thanks Santosh. Return value Number of characters Arguments text - The text for which to calculate length. The output will be 8 and printed in the message box. As shown in rows three and six, the empty string has 0 lengths. enter the formula =LEN (A2)>15 into "Format values where this formula is true", where A2 is the first cell which contains the value, and >15 is the criteria to highlight cells. To do this, click the Formula tab and in the 'Formula Auditing' group, click on the Error Checking drop-down icon (the small downward pointing arrow). Thanks for contributing an answer to Stack Overflow! If you provide a wrong argument or dont specify the optional argument (where its needed for the formula to work), its going to give you a wrong result. The LEN Function [1] is categorized under Excel TEXT functions. You may also like the following Excel tutorials: Hi Sumit, Your email address is private and not shared. =IF (G4="","",TEXT (G4,"mmmm")) Hope this helps. worksheetfunction.SUM works worksheetfunction.COUNT works another example: Sub LEN () msgbox worksheetfunction.Len (ActiveCell) End Sub this wont work. As already mentioned, the Excel LEN function counts absolutely all characters in a specified cell, including all spaces - leading, trailing spaces, and spaces between words. Replied on January 2, 2013. Can I auto-format Excel or Google Sheets cells containing times to include leading zeros for times less than 10 minutes or less than 1 minute? The LEN formula in Excel has only one critical parameter, text. Hover the cursor over the Circular reference option and it will show you the cell that has the circular reference issue. For example, the VLOOKUP function takes three mandatory arguments and one optional argument. This LEN Function is very simple and easy to use. Login details for this free course will be emailed to you. All you need to do in this case is either set the calculation back to automatic or force a recalculation by hitting the F9 key. Let us understand the working of the LENGTH function in Excel by some examples. Here we need to use FIND & LEN function to determine the number of characters from the given text. Communities help you ask and answer questions, give feedback, and hear from experts with rich knowledge. So, even when I copy this formula down, the table array will continue to refer to A2:B6. Regards, Ashish Mathur. If you want it to first do the addition and then the multiplication, you need to use the below formula: In some cases, the order of precedence may work for you, but its still recommended that you use the parenthesis to avoid any confusion. If we select any range of cells, we will get the #Value error. I used LEN in the column to the left of column C, so B. I had been using column D. For some reason, column B returned the numerical value. Here I have taken a date as an example. If you find yourself in a situation where as soon as you type the formula as hit enter, you see the formula instead of the value, its a clear case of the cell being formatted as text. error. Solution: Remove the start_num argument if it is not required, or set it to the correct appropriate value. If the Excel LEFT function does not work properly in your worksheets, it's most likely because of one of the following reasons. The function will return the length of a given text string. The LEN function does not include formatting length. AnyString = "Hello World" ' Define string. The Excel LEN function returns the length of a given text string as the number of characters. (which earlier referred to the cell that we deleted). Thank you so very much for making the site!! The most important thing to know about the LEN function is it only counts the character length for only one cell. You will probably have to re-enter the formula. Below are the names of the employees, and you needed to extract the Last Name separately. In such cases, we can use the following function: LEN(A1), which would return the result 10. Hover the cursor over the Circular reference option and it will show you the cell that has the circular reference issue. LEN will also count characters in numbers, but number formatting is not included. Therefore, what TRIM has done here is removed the unwanted space and return only the text value; that is why now our formula in cell C1 shows both the values as TRUE. Why are players required to record the moves in World Championship Classical games? LENB returns the number of bytes used to represent the characters in a text string. Arrow Keys not Working in Excel | Moving Pages Instead of Cells. You can replace the example text with your own, but youll need to surround the text string in quote marks. The LEN function is a simple calculation function that counts all the characters in a given text string, including numbers, letters, special characters, and spaces. Formula This has been a guide to LEN Function. Import data from a database that supports and that contains zero-length strings. Thank you for the great tutorials, Learn Excel with high quality video training. In the below example, I have used the LEN function to count letters in a cell. Suppose we are given the following values: Let us now use the LEN function to remove characters from the data below: We wish to remove miles from the Distance column. Browse other questions tagged, Where developers & technologists share private knowledge with coworkers, Reach developers & technologists worldwide, LEN returns that length of a string or number. Apply LEN to A1 and find out how many characters are there in the A1 cell, Apply LEN to B1 to find out how many characters are there in the B1 cell, and cell B1, 13 characters are there. Excel formula to find the rightmost column containing a value in a table, Parsing an ISO8601 date/time (including TimeZone) in Excel. If commutes with all generators, then Casimir operator? LEN takes just oneargument, text. Our videos are quick, clean, and to the point, so you can learn Excel in less time, and easily review key topics when needed. If you use the third method or the fourth method in the bulleted listed to create a zero-length string, the formula bar is blank, but the cell is not. I gave a try in excel 2010 and it worked for me. In addition, this function calculates the number of characters in a given string provided as an input. User community support forum for Apache OpenOffice, LibreOffice and all the OpenOffice.org derivatives, Post For example, suppose you have a dataset as shown below where you need to know the score of Mark in Exam 2 (in cell F2). LEN will also count characters in numbers, but number formatting is not included. This happens because when I deleted the row, the formula doesnt know what to reference now. LEN Function with TRIM is a beautiful combination in Excel. LEN works with numbers, but number formatting is not included. And in this article, I will highlight those common issues that are likely the cause of your Excel formulas not working. Since this function counts everything in the cells, this becomes important to know how to exclude some of the alphabets or values.read more, excluding leading and trailing spaces. The languages that support DBCS include Japanese, Chinese (Simplified), Chinese (Traditional), and Korean. It sounds like the M2 value is numeric-text.not a number. Cells Formatted as Text In some cases, this may be exactly what you want, and in some cases, this may work against you. 1 It's because you're calling the function recursively - calling it from within itself (in the For i = 0 to numFolders - 1 loop). For example, if you enter 1/1, Excel would convert it to 01-Jan of the current year. Let us know what you find. Now, I apply a filter to the item column to only show the records for Printer sales. Show more Show more Excel. In my case, when I do this, it converts it into the number 43831 (for 01-01-2020). If you only want to get the sum/count/average of visible cells, use SUBTOTAL or AGGREGATE functions. While I can see that the formula is correct and the name Mark is clearly there is the list, what I can not see is that there is a trailing space in the cell that has the name (in cell D2). I often have to use files with EAN-codes in it. A zero length string may be a result of the following conditions: To work around this issue, clear the zero-length string from the cell. In a past life, he was a UK college lecturer, training teens and adults. Let me start by pointing out the obvious. If there is an apostrophe, you can simply remove it. The text whose length you want to find. The LEN is returning. Copyright 2023 . List of Excel Shortcuts Login details for this Free course will be emailed to you. The result is 4, which is fed to LEFT as the number of characters to extract. Copy the example data in the following table, and paste it in cell A1 of a new Excel worksheet. To do this, select the cell, click Edit, and then click Clear All. errors due to cut/paste operations (which I have advised against) and the users dont necessarily know it. In case the above steps dont solve the problem, another thing to check is whether the cell has an apostrophe at the beginning. If the cell is empty, the LENGTH function returns 0 as output. But the EAN-codes are automaticly transposed to Exponential values. This one setting can drive you crazy (if you dont know its whats causing all the issues). The function will return the length of a given text string. Hi - I'm Dave Bruns, and I run Exceljet with my wife, Lisa. To do this, select the cell, click Edit, and then click Clear All. But I still have one very nasty problem, maybe you have a solution for this. What is the cause? You can refer to only one cell at a time. The LENGTH function in Excel is very simple and easy to use. In the below example, I have used the LEN function to count letters in a cell. Key takeaway Understand the correct use and limitations of a function in Excel. Dim AnyString, MyStr. Let me show you what I mean by using an example. This is a reference error that tells you that there is some issue with the references in the formula. While I have taken the VLOOKUP example, this is also a common issue when working with TEXT functions. Spaces count as characters. In most cases I can find the solution. If you tell it to exit while it's calling itself from within the For loop it will return to execution in the For loop. * Please provide your correct email id. As we wanted a numeric value and not a text value, we ran the text through the VALUE function, which converted numbers in text format to plain numbers. if your value shows $1500.00, then it will show as 4 only instead of 8. RIGHT returns thetext to the right of that position. =LEN (A1) As previously mentioned, you can also use LEN to calculate the length of a text string written into the formula directly using the example formula below. Part 1: This part determines the desired text that you want to extract from the characters. This is something that happens quite often to me when I am using lookup formulas. If text is an empty string ("") or text is a reference to an empty cell, LEN returns zero. In financial analysis, the LEN function can be useful if we wish to get the length of a given text string as the number of characters. Since you need to use an optional argument to specify where you want VLOOKUP to do an exact match or an approximate match, not specifying this (or using the wrong argument) can cause issues. Returns the length of a given text string. For more information about working with VBA, select Developer Reference in the drop-down list next to Search and enter one or more terms in the search box. Ive actually been gorging on your articles and videos every night this week. (MAY NEED TO CHANGE THE FORMAT OF D1, AT THE MOMEN FORMULA READ CELL D1 VALUE 1 ISO 1.0) THE EXPECTED RESULT IS IN A1=1 AND IN B1=.0 PLS HELP This thread is locked. error in the cells. Robort Adam), and for the third one, it is 12 (including space, i.e. We can provide the text argument for the function: As a worksheet function, LEN can be entered as part of a formula in a cell of a worksheet. That means LEN(E3) FIND(F3) (16 5) = 11 character from the right side, Len gives 17 characters, and Find gives 5 characters for the first employee. I'm having a strange issue here with Excel. Since we needed to do an exact match in this case, the formula returns an error for some names. If total energies differ across different software, how do I decide which software to use? Also to avoid need for CTRL+SHIFT+ENTER you could use SUMPRODUCT in place of SUM, i.e. LEN counts the number of characters in text, including space and punctuation, and returns a number as the result. We create short videos, and clear examples of formulas, functions, pivot tables, conditional formatting, and charts. UPDATE: Ok, so about 1 minute after posting this I think I figured it out? Problem: The start_num argument is greater than the within_text argument For example, the function: =FIND ("s","Functions and formulas",25) And since Excel stores date and time values as numbers, as soon as you enter 1/1, it converts it into a number representing the January 1 of the current year. This spreadsheet was originally created using Google Sheets, not sure if that might explain it? When you dont specify the last argument, it automatically does an approximate match by default. 2023 - EDUCBA. Drag the same formula for the rest of the cells. In this case, the formula calculates (as it returns a value), but the result is incorrect (instead of score in Exam 2, it gives the score in Exam 1). I used the following function =RIGHT(A2,LEN(A2)-SEARCH(":",A2)) It should output me the string after :. The LEN function in Excel is also known as the LENGTH Excel function, which identifies the length of a given string. Since we launched in 2006, our articles have been read billions of times. Part 3: The FIND function determines from which number space begins, i.e. LEN function in Excel not returning a numerical value, How a top-ranked engineering school reimagined CS curriculum (Ep. The Date is stored as a number(Integer as number of days since 12/31/1899 and time is the decimal part per day). A cell with an error value will return that error in the result. Now I will explain the huge benefit of the LEN function when you want to compare two similar sets of data sets. Instead of using Exit Function in this position, declare a Boolean variable and set it to True, here. Click Home > Conditional Formatting > New Rule. The issue is that we have used the wrong formula here. Full explanation here. Formatting of numbers is not a part of the LEN function, i.e. LEN function in Excel, where Len is taken from a length, is used to count the number of characters in a cell. Excel Formulas Not Working: Possible Reasons and How to FIX IT! 1. Unlike other Excel functions, the LEN function is extremely simple to use. And in case there are multiple words in the sheet name (lets say its Example Data), the reference would be =Example Data!A1 (where the name is enclosed in single quotes followed by an exclamation sign). J. Johnston). We use the length formula in Excel with TRIM to exclude the leading and trailing spaces. Below is the formula that I use in cell F2 and then copies to all the cells below it: As you can see that this formula gives an error in some cases. 1. These functions may not be available in all languages. This website or its third-party tools use cookies, which are necessary to its functioning and required to achieve the purposes illustrated in the cookie policy. Below is a simple example, where I use the SUM formula in cell A4 while using it in the calculation itself. I recognize these problems and have to deal with this a lot when I receive files or questions from other people.
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