Make LEFT Function recognize a number in Excel

Are you wondering if there is a way to force a LEFT function to recognize a number?

Let see how we use Left function in Excel?

The LEFT function treats numbers (digits) as Text, evenwhen contained in a true Number entry. Therefore, when using digits as operators within these functions, the output must be treated as Text.

We will use the LEFT & VALUE functions to make a formula that will convert text into numbers.

LEFT: Returns the specified number of characters from the start of a text string.
 

 
Text:It is the text string from which you need to extract the characters.

num_chars:It specifies the number of characters from the left which you want to extract.

VALUE: Converts a text string that represents a number to a number
 

 
Text:It is the text value which needs to be converted into numbers

Let us take an example to see that how we can use Left formula in Excel:

• We have some telephone numbers in column A

• We need to find the first 3 numbers of these phone numbers.

• In cell B2,enter the formula =VALUE(LEFT(A2,3))

• The LEFT function will extract the first 3 digits but will be displayed as text (left aligned) &the VALUE function will convert the output into numbers (right aligned).

• We can copy the formula down to the range B3:B11 to achieve the desired result for the whole data set.

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