20 Excel Date Shortcuts That Will Save You Time

Are you tired of wasting time formatting dates in Excel? You’re in luck! Here are 20 shortcuts that will make date formatting easy and quick. Get ready to save precious time and energy with these Excel date tips!

Excel Date Shortcuts: A Quick Overview

Excel is a powerful spreadsheet program. It’s used by businesses, educational institutions and many industries.

Working with dates can be time-consuming in Excel. This is where date shortcuts come in! They can save you time and effort.

Date shortcuts offer lots of options to do various things. You can quickly access them using keyboard keys. This lets you do tasks with clicks. Change the date’s format, insert the current date or time, and calculate the difference between two dates. It’s all possible!

These shortcuts work using hotkeys. For example, Ctrl + ; puts in the current date, while Ctrl + Shift + : puts in the current time. Hotkeys can be tailored to suit your needs. That way, you can use the same keys for different Excel workbooks.

To sum up, Excel date shortcuts are an easy way to work with dates. You can save time and work more efficiently. With just a few clicks, insert the current date, change date formats or calculate the difference between two dates. Customizing shortcuts lets you work faster and smarter.

To make the most of Excel date shortcuts, here are some tips. Learn the hotkeys and what they do. Customize the hotkeys to suit your needs. Practice with the shortcuts regularly to build muscle memory.

Formatting Dates Made Easy

Using Excel for formatting dates can be tricky. But there are shortcuts to make it easy! In this article, we’ll look at how to customize date formats. We’ll also explore time-saving shortcuts to add or subtract days quickly. Finally, we’ll discover an instant method to calculate the difference between two dates – without manual calculations taking hours!

Customize Dates the Way You Want

Excel allows you to extract specific date segments in a custom format, such as day or year. This is known as “Date Extracting“. To do this, search for “Extract_Date” in the formula bar.

You can customize how the date is presented according to language and region via System Settings. Just click on “Language and Region” under Options.

If no appropriate format is available, you can make your own. Combine letters (e.g. d for day) and text symbols (e.g. slash /) with the text box feature. It takes more advanced skills but gives you complete control over how the data appears.

Bill Gates was the pioneer of early spreadsheet programs, before Excel. Visicalc software made accounting easier than ever. It allowed creating expense reports by simply choosing formulas like SUM().

Learn more about handy Time-Saving Shortcuts for Adding and Subtracting Days. These tips will help you work with dates quicker and more efficiently.

Time-Saving Shortcuts for Adding and Subtracting Days

It’s easy to add or subtract days to a specific date with a plus (+) or minus (-) sign. Just type =TODAY()+7 into a cell and you get the date seven days from now. You can even use positive/negative numbers, depending on what you need to do.

Time-Saving Shortcuts for Adding and Subtracting Days include using functions like DATE, YEARFRAC and EDATE. Excel also has many built-in functions that let you do complex calculations, like the NETWORKDAYS function, which returns the number of working days between two dates.

These shortcuts will save time on tasks involving dates, like adding days/years/months/weeks. Master these techniques and you’ll be able to complete tasks quickly and effectively. Learn more about Calculate Date Differences in a Flash for more tricks.

Calculate Date Differences in a Flash

Working with dates and times can be tricky. But, Excel date shortcuts make calculating date differences a breeze! Here are six points to help you:

1. Select two cells with your dates.
2. Enter the formula =B2-A2.
3. Get the number of days between dates.
4. To get a whole number instead of decimal, add INT() to the formula: =INT(B2-A2).
5. Divide by 7 to get weeks: =(B2-A2)/7.
6. Use DATEDIF() to get months.

Using even one of these tricks saves time. Don’t miss out – try them now! Nothing beats watching data calculate precisely! Now, let’s move on to our next heading and learn some cool tips and tricks for working with dates.

Tips and Tricks for Working with Dates

I’m an Excel enthusiast, so I’m always looking for new ways to save time and become more productive. Dates are a great area where Excel can help. Whether it’s project milestones, events, or trends, knowing date functions is key. I’m going to share three of my best tips.

1. We’ll figure out the last day of a month
2. Generate dynamic date ranges
3. Calculate ages from dates of birth

These Excel Date Shortcuts will help you work faster and make better decisions with accurate data.

Find the Last Day of Any Month with Ease

Figuring out the last day of a month can be tough, but Excel makes it easy! Here’s how:

1. Select the cell you want to show the last day of the month in.
2. Type =EOMONTH( into the formula bar, then select the cell with the start date.
3. After that, type “,” (comma) in the formula bar.
4. Enter either 0 or -1 after the comma. This signifies if you need this month’s end or next month’s end date.
5. Then, close off the formula with a closing parenthesis.

It is important to know the last day of a month when dealing with financial statements, tracking expenses, and calculating monthly interest payments. Keep in mind, Excel’s DATE function considers dates before January 1, 1900 as invalid! To enter years before 1900, you need to customize your worksheet settings.

For more tips and tricks on working with dates, read ahead to the next topic, “Create Dynamic Date Ranges for Better Tracking“.

Create Dynamic Date Ranges for Better Tracking

Make tracking data and staying organized in Excel easier with dynamic date ranges. Six ways to do this are:

• TODAY function to get today’s date
• EOMONTH function to find last day of month
• DATE function for custom date
• Combine functions for complex formulas
• Conditional formatting for date range highlighting
• Pivot table with date rows or columns & filters.

Dynamic date ranges help visualize trends & patterns. Therefore, it’s important for success.

For example, one user utilized this to manage their finances. By creating dynamic date ranges for bills & expenses, they saw how much money was going out monthly and made adjustments.

Finally, we’ll explore how to calculate age from someone’s date of birth.

Simple Steps to Calculate Age from Date of Birth

To calculate someone’s age with their birth date, here is what to do:

1. Input the person’s birth date in date format in Excel
2. Use the TODAY() function for the current date
3. Subtract the birth date from today’s date to get the number of days lived
4. Divide by 365.25 (the average days in a year) for the age as a decimal
5. Round down for the age as a whole number
6. Use the INT function for precision

Using birth dates can be helpful for various reasons, like benefits or programs. These steps make it simple and precise.

Also remember that dates in Excel are numbers, so they can be manipulated.

Yet, this method is only an estimate due to the 365.25 days assumption. To improve accuracy, use a more precise divisor like 365.2422 or a formula designed for calculating ages.

Excel also has shortcuts for automating date tasks. Read the next section to learn these time-saving tricks!

Automate Your Tasks with Excel’s Date Shortcuts

As an Excel lover, I’m always on the hunt for new ways to speed up my work and save time. That’s why I was delighted to find Excel’s date shortcuts! In this section, I want to show you how to use them to automate tasks.

Specifically, I’ll teach you how to:

1. Add the current date with one click
2. Create timestamps for precise record keeping
3. Fill in weekdays quickly

With these simple yet powerful shortcuts, you’ll be able to boost your Excel skills and productivity in no time.

Add the Current Date Automatically to Your Spreadsheets

Want to add the current date to your spreadsheets? Excel has some shortcuts that make it easy. Press Ctrl + ; (semicolon) to insert today’s date in a cell.

Also press Ctrl + Shift + ; (semicolon) to insert the current time. You can use TODAY() and NOW() functions for dates and times.

Ctrl+ Shift+ # (hashtag) will format dates in number format. This trick is useful if you need to enter the same date multiple times. For example, if you’re tracking attendance in a school, pressing Ctrl + ; is faster than typing the date each time.

Create timestamps with ‘Create Timestamps for Efficient Record Keeping’ to keep track of when each entry was made.

Create Timestamps for Efficient Record Keeping

Just click “Ctrl+Shift+;” and the current date and time will be inserted into a cell! This is great for making records of activities and easily pinpointing changes.

If inserting multiple timestamps is needed, use “Ctrl+;“. For example, when creating an attendance sheet with sign-in and sign-out times.

For separating date and time into different cells or columns, use the Text-to-Columns feature (Data>Text-to-Columns). This will save you hours of work!

Timestamps are used for tracking important events for future reference, like in medicine or forensics. They provide an accurate reference even if people come and go, or files are lost/stolen/deleted.

Save valuable time by automatically filling in weekdays!

Fill in Weekdays Automatically to Save Valuable Time

Select a cell for inputting a weekday. Type in the start date in any format, like 1/1/2022 or January 1, 2022. Hold down Ctrl and press semicolon (;). Get the current date in the cell!

No need to remember weekdays or count days to Friday; this shortcut simplifies it. Using this feature saves my workday from distractions.

A colleague was not aware of this trick. She spent minutes entering weekdays. After explaining, she was thrilled at the time she could save on tasks – not just weekdays, but also deadlines, project timelines, etc.

Excel’s date shortcuts provide productivity and efficiency. Stress levels are minimized by tedious data entry tasks. Optimizing workflow leads to better results in any workday.

FAQs about 20 Excel Date Shortcuts That Will Save You Time

What are the 20 Excel date shortcuts that will save you time?

Here are the 20 Excel date shortcuts that will save you time:

• Ctrl+; – Adds the current date to the cell
• Ctrl+Shift+; – Adds the current time to the cell
• Ctrl+Shift+# – Changes the format to date
• Ctrl+Shift+@ – Changes the format to time
• Ctrl+Shift+! – Applies comma formatting
• Ctrl+Shift+$ – Applies currency formatting
• Ctrl+Shift+% – Applies percent formatting
• Ctrl+1 – Opens the Format Cells dialog box
• Ctrl+Shift+# – Changes the format to date with the day of the week
• Ctrl+Shift+^ – Applies exponential formatting
• Ctrl+Shift+~ – Applies general formatting
• Ctrl+Shift+& – Applies border
• Ctrl+Shift+_ – Removes border
• Ctrl+Shift+* – Selects the current region around the active cell
• Ctrl+Shift+Home – Selects all cells from the current location to the beginning of the worksheet
• Ctrl+Shift+End – Selects all cells from the current location to the end of the worksheet
• Ctrl+Arrow Key – Moves the cursor to the last cell in the row or column with data
• Ctrl+Shift+Arrow Key – Selects cells up to the last cell with data in the row or column
• Ctrl+[ – Jumps to the precedents of the active cell
• Ctrl+] – Jumps to the dependents of the active cell