Extract text from a cell in Excel

Sometimes it is useful (or necessary) to extract part of a cell into another cell in Excel. For example, you may have a cell that contains a combination of text and numbers, or a cell that contains two numbers separated by a delimiter such as a comma.

To do this, you can use one of the text manipulation functions available in Excel. These include LEFT() and RIGHT(). You may also need to use the LEN() function, which calculates the length of a value in a cell.

RIGHT() function syntax

The RIGHT() function has the following syntax:

=RIGHT(text, number of characters)

The RIGHT() function works by taking the specified number of characters starting from the right end of the text value entered. 

Example of the RIGHT() function in action

To use the RIGHT() function, follow these steps:

  • Click on a cell and enter the RIGHT() function:
    Excel, typing the RIGHT function
  • Enter the two arguments for the function as shown in the following example:
    Excel worked example of the RIGHT() function
  • The value shown in the third cell is the result of the formula, i.e. the five characters taken from a starting point of the right-most value (i.e. the last character) in the cell (A3 in this example).
    • Note that in this example, the result of the RIGHT() formula, 12345, is a number and will be treated as such by Excel.
    • This means that the result of the formula in this example can be used in other numerical calculations within your Excel spreadsheet.

LEFT() function syntax

The LEFT() function has the following syntax:

=LEFT(text, number of characters)

The LEFT() function works by taking the specified number of characters starting from the left end of the text value entered.

Example of the LEFT() function in action

To use the LEFT() function, follow these steps:

  • Click on a cell and enter the LEFT() function:
    Excel, typing the LEFT function into a cell
  • Enter the two arguments for the function as shown in the following example:
    Excel worked example of the LEFT() function
  • The value shown in the third cell is the result of the formula, i.e. the 6 characters taken from a starting point of the left-most value (i.e. the first character) in the cell (A5 in this example).

There is a lot more you can do with text manipulation of cells in Excel. The LEFT() and RIGHT() functions are essential building blocks to any kind of text manipulation or text extraction in Excel.