How to count characters in Microsoft Excel

Although Excel is primarily used for working with numeric data, you can also include text in cells. So, if you need to transfer data in Excel and limit the number of characters in a cell, you may need to know how to calculate the number of characters.

With these factors in mind, we wrote this article to share some practical tips to help you count characters in Microsoft Excel as easily as you count words.

How to count characters in Microsoft Excel

Although you may need to count characters in a single cell, in real life you may also need to perform the same operation on multiple cells or ranges of cells. We provide detailed guides to help you handle character calculations and operations in Microsoft Excel.

Character counting for single/multiple cells

Calculate characters within a single/multiple cell range

Count specific characters in Excel

1]Use the LEN formula to calculate the number of characters

For a single cell

In Excel, to count the number of characters in a single cell, you can use the text function LEN. Although the syntax is LEN(cell), the exact formula is used to count the number of characters.

=LEN(单元格)

Replace (Cell) with the cell reference whose characters you want to count. So, for example, if you want to count the number of characters in cell G6 (as shown in the image above), the formula would be:

=LEN(G6)

Please note that in Microsoft Excel, all punctuation marks, spaces, and even punctuation marks after a string are counted as characters in the sentence.

Also, to calculate the number of bytes in a cell, you can use the LENB function, such as =LENB(A2).

For multiple communities

However, if you want to count the total number of characters in multiple cells, you can use the following formula to get the result:

=SUM（LEN（cell1），LEN（cell2），LEN（cell3））

So, in this example, you need to use the LEN function for all the cells whose characters you want to count, and add the SUM function to them.

For example, if you want to count the total number of characters in cells A4, A6, and A8, the formula would look like this:

=SUM(LEN(A4)、LEN(A6)、LEN(A8))

Read: How to convert numbers stored as text to numbers in Excel

2] Count characters within a single/multiple cell range

Single cell range formula

However, if you want to count characters in adjacent (adjacent) cell ranges, there are two methods. While the above formula can also help you easily count the number of characters in a range of cells, using the formula below can also help you quickly achieve the same calculation. So, for example, to count the total number of characters in cells A4 through A8, the formula would look like this:

=SUM(镜头(A4：A8))

Alternatively, you can use the following formula to achieve the same results:

=SUMPRODUCT(LEN(A4：A8))

Multiple cell range formulas

However, if you want to know the total number of characters in multiple cell ranges (for example, from A4 to A8 and from B4 to B8), you can use the following formula:

=SUM(镜头(A4：A8)，镜头(B4：B8))

或

=SUMPRODUCT(LEN(A4：A8)，LEN(B4：B8))

Read: How to circle numbers in Excel

3] Count specific characters in Excel

For specific characters in Excel

Sometimes, after adding text to a cell in Excel, you may need to count the total number of specific characters in that specific cell. In this case you can use LEN with the replacement function. So, for example, if you want to count the number of E's in cell A4, the formula would look like this:

=LEN（A4）-LEN（SUBSTITUTE（A4，“e”，"”））

Here, replacement is case-sensitive. So if you enter letters in lower case it will return results accordingly and vice versa.

However, you can also choose to ignore letter case, you can use the following formula in the above format:

=LEN(A4)-LEN(替换(UPER(A4)，“E”，“”))

For specific characters in a range of cells,

Now, to count the total number of characters in a range of cells, you need to use all three functions: LEN, SUM, and SUB. So, for example, if you want to count the number of a specific character, such as E, in the cell range A4 to A8, the formula would look like this:

=sum(LEN(A4：A8)-LEN(替换(UPPER(A4：A8)，“E”，“”))

Read: How to spell check a specific range, part, cell or column in Excel

How to count the number of texts in Excel?

To count the number of cells containing text in Excel, you can use the formula =COUNTIF(Range, "*"). You can then replace that range with the range of cells you want to calculate. This formula counts all cells within the specified range that contain text. It ensures accurate data management and analysis.

What is the formula to calculate LEN in Excel?

The formula for LEN in Excel is =LEN(text), where text illustrates the cell reference or string you want to measure. This formula generates the total count of characters present, which includes spaces and punctuation marks, in the specified cell's content. For instance, =LEN(A1) counts the character count in cell A1.

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