Forum Discussion
Date Formatting Won't Change
- Finally figured this out.
Change the date format of your computer from the taskbar.
Regardless of timezone and all, go to your task bar> click the time/date > region >then look for additional date, time & regional settings > change date, time and number formats> additional settings> then go to the date tab and you can manually set the format by using the MMM dd yyyy or whichever format you want it in. Restart your computer and it should work on excel.
Wew
Thanks so much for the fast reply.
I looked up what the first ones look like under date and it is same as yours.
What I did now:
I marked all cells and chose format text. Then I chose those cells that are supposed to have a date format and chose the first option as with the asterisk in your screenshot.
Then I entered the date as you said in this way: 10/10/2018
But it shows now exactly how I entered it as 10/10/2018. But if I chose in the format the first option: should it then not show it the way it is displayed in that box?
What I actually wanted is to have e.g. in A2 a date and in A3 this date plus 5 days as it should serve as a follow up due date and put some conditional formatting to it with colours if it is overdue to follow up.
Hope this makes sense.
But even though I inserted it now as a date (I hope) and put into A3 then =A2+5 it just shows "Value" but according to some other forum info it should add the to the days and would give me then in theory 15/10/2018.
Not sure what I do wrong :-(
Thanks
Chris
Chris,
1) Don't format all cells as text before you start to work with them, keep default format (General).
2) Enter the date not as on my screenshot, but in one which you see in your formatting options. We may have different default date formats.
After that =A2+5 shall work. In behind dates in Excel are just sequential integer numbers starting from 1 which is 01 January, 1900. And 13 Oct 2018 is 43386. On the top is only formatting.
Thanks kindly!
Is there a possibility to amend somewhere the default format to e.g. dd/mm/yyyy ?
Or how is the default date format set?
Is this depending on which version one works?
Thank you!
Chris, that's Windows setting, not Excel one. Press Win+R, here "control international" and Enter.
In opened windows you may check / change default formats
Note, if you change format here that affects all your applications, not only Excel.
Thanks Sergei,
I found the general settings of windows and amended it. Now it is the way I wanted it.
Thanks so much for your help. Much appreciated and glad it worked out after all.
And also the little formula for the due date works.
Such a small thing to change but if you don't know where it makes you pulling your hair.
I was not aware it is in general settings but thought it must be somewhere in excel :-)
kind regards
Chris