How to Concatenate Date That Doesn’t Become Number in Excel (5 Ways)

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When your dataset has values like dates, numbers, texts etc. and you want to concatenate them, Excel throws some random numbers at you. To concatenate the date with other strings and to make sure that the format won’t become into number format, you need to know some tricks, and, in this article, we will show you how to do that.


How to Concatenate Date in Excel that Doesn’t Become Number: 5 Methods

Excel has the CONCATENATE function to concatenate values. But the result that the CONCATENATE function produces, changes the previous format that the input cells have and returns with a new cell format. To avoid this problem, we have to perform the CONCATENATE function with the TEXT function in Excel. In the following section, we will learn how to perform concatenation with Excel’s TEXT function that will keep a certain cell format.

1. Concatenate Date with Text and Keep Date Format in Excel

Look at the following image where we have shown you what happens when you connect Text and Dates together. If you concatenate Text with Dates, then the Dates will become some numbers while connecting with the Texts.

The formula that was applied to get the concatenated result in Column E is shown in Column F.

We will learn how to concatenate the Name and Date in our dataset and have the date format intact.

Steps:

  • First, select any cell to store the result (in our case, it is Cell E5).
  • Then, write the following formula,
=CONCATENATE(B5, " ", TEXT(C5, "mm/dd/yyyy"))
This formula will connect the text value, John, in Cell B5 with the date value, 3/2/2022, in Cell C5 in “mm/dd/yyyy” format.
  • Now, press Enter.

Concatenate Date with Text doesn't becomes number in Excel

We have the concatenated result for the first value of our dataset.

  • Now, drag the Fill Handle to apply the formula to the rest of the cells.

Excel Concatenate Date with Text doesn't becomes number

All the data of your dataset is now perfectly concatenated while having a certain date format.

Concatenate Date with Text doesn't becomes number Excel


2. Concatenate Date and Number while Keeping the Date Format

Like Text values, Excel’s CONCATENATE also can’t keep the cell’s format perfect while executing. Look at the picture below. We have some Numbers in a percentage format and some Date values. After concatenating them, they produced some scattered results which we weren’t expecting.

So, now we will see how to keep the format undamaged when we concatenate them.

Steps:

  • First, select any cell to store the result (in our case, it is Cell E5).
  • Then, write the following formula,
=CONCATENATE(TEXT(B5, "0.00%"), " and ", TEXT(C5, "mm/dd/yyyy"))
This formula will connect the number value, 1543.00%, in Cell B5 with the date value, 3/2/2022, in Cell C5 in “0.00%” format for percentage number and “mm/dd/yyyy” format for the date. We have added “ and “ in the middle just to make the result meaningful. You can add any text that you want.
  • Now, press Enter.

Concatenate Date with Numbers doesn't becomes number in Excel

We have the concatenated result for the first value of our dataset.

  • Now, drag the Fill Handle to apply the formula to the rest of the cells.

Concatenate Date with numbers doesn't becomes number Excel

All the data of your dataset is now perfectly concatenated while having a certain format.


3. Join Two Dates Together in Excel while Preserving the Format

Even concatenating two date values won’t let you keep the date formats untouched. To see the proof, look at the picture provided below. Here, we linked two types of date formats and ended up with some scary looking numbers.

To avoid the problem, we need to perform two TEXT functions in our formula.

Steps:

  • First, select any cell to store the result (in our case, it is Cell E5).
  • Then, write the following formula,
=CONCATENATE(TEXT(B5, "mm/dd/yyyy"), " means ", TEXT(C5, "dddd, mmmm dd, yyyy"))
This formula will connect the first format of date value, 3/2/2022, in Cell B5 with the second format of date value, Wednesday, March 2, 2022, in Cell C5 in “mm/dd/yyyy” format for the first type of date values and “mm/dd/yyyy” format for the second type of date values. We have added “ means “ in the middle just to make the result meaningful. You can add any text that you want.
  • Now, press Enter.

Concatenate two date doesn't becomes number in Excel

We have the concatenated result for the first value of our dataset.

  • Now, drag the Fill Handle to apply the formula to the rest of the cells.

Concatenate two date doesn't becomes number Excel

All the data of your dataset is now perfectly concatenated while having a certain format.

Read More: How to Combine Date and Text in Excel


4. Connect Excel Date and Time and Prevent to Change into Number

Now, look at the mess (in the following picture, in the Concatenate Result column (E) while connecting the dates and times together in Excel.

To make this dataset meaningful, you need to follow the steps that we are going to show you now.

Steps:

  • First, select any cell to store the result (in our case, it is Cell E5).
  • Then, write the following formula,
=CONCATENATE(TEXT(B5, "mm/dd/yyyy"), " ", TEXT(C5, "h:mm:ss AM/PM"))
This formula will connect the date value, 3/2/2022, in Cell B5 with the time value, 10:22:12 AM, in Cell C5 in “mm/dd/yyyy” format for the date value and “h:mm:ss AM/PM” format for the time value. We have added a space (“ “) in the middle just to make the result meaningful. You can add any string that you want.
  • Now, press Enter.

Concatenate Date with Time doesn't becomes number in Excel

We have the concatenated result for the first value of our dataset.

  • Now, drag the Fill Handle to apply the formula to the rest of the cells.

Concatenate Date with Time doesn't becomes number Excel

All of the data of your dataset is now perfectly concatenated while having a certain format.


5. Concatenate Day, Month and Year in Excel

This time, we will learn how to concatenate Day, Month, Year and place them in a specific format, not like an unorganized format shown in the image below.

We will do some tricks here. We will add 0 with the cells that hold concatenated results and then we will re-format those cells to have our desired cell format.

Steps to format concatenated results are given below.

Steps:

  • First, select any cell to format and store the result (in our case, it is Cell G5).
  • In that cell, pass the cell reference that you want to format and add 0 with it.

For instance, we wanted to have a specific format for the concatenated result stored in Cell F5. So, in our case, the formula in Cell G5 becomes like this:

=F5+0

It will convert the date format stored in Cell F5 into Excel number format.

  • Now, press Enter. You have generated the number for the date in Cell F5.
  • Later, drag the Fill Handle to apply the formula to the rest of the cells.

You have all the dates in number format now.

  • This time, select all the formatted data.
  • Next, go to the Number Format dropdown list in the Home
  • From the list, select More Number Formats…

  • From the Format Cells pop-up window, pick the Date Category and select any Date Type that you want. For our case, we picked the 3/14/2012
  • Lastly, click OK.

Look at the following image.

Concatenate Day, month, year doesn't becomes number in Excel

All the data are now perfectly formatted in the specified date format.


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Conclusion

This article explained how to concatenate a date that doesn’t become a number in Excel. I hope this article has been very beneficial to you. Feel free to ask if you have any questions regarding the topic.


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Sanjida Ahmed
Sanjida Ahmed

Sanjida Ahmed, who graduated from Daffodil International University with a degree in Software Engineering, has worked with SOFTEKO since 2021. She has written over 100 articles on Excel & VBA and, since 2022, has worked as the Project Manager of the Excel Extension Development Project in the Software Development Department. Since starting this software development, she has established an outstanding workflow encompassing a full SDLC. She always tries to create a bridge between her skills and interests in... Read Full Bio

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