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Split a String in Excel

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This page
Excel Functions  ▾ describes how to
split a string in
16 New Functions Excel using
Excel's Left, Mid
and Right
13 New Functions
functions.

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Split String
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rmulas Split a String at a Specified Related Page:

Position
Excel String Concatenation
ng in Excel Split a String at the First
Occurrence of a Character
icks Split a String at the N'th
Occurrence of a Character
n Excel Errors

mplates
Split a String at a Specified Position
cros There are three built-in Excel functions that are designed for splitting a
string at a specified position. These are the Excel Left, Mid and Right
A Tutorial functions. These functions are each described below:

VBA Functions
Excel Left, Mid and Right Functions
03 vs 2007
The Excel Left function returns a specified number of characters
from the left (the beginning) of a supplied text string.
ended Books
In the example below, the Left function returns the first two
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characters of the string "test string":
Excel Formulas
=LEFT( "test string", 2 ) returns the text string "te"
Example Excel
The Excel Mid function returns a specified number of characters
Token from the middle of a supplied text string, beginning at a specified
character.
Excel Templates
In the example below, the Mid function returns 3 characters from
the middle of the string "test string", starting from character
number 6:

=MID( "test string", 6, 3 ) returns the text string "str".

The Excel Right function returns a specified number of characters

from the right (the end) of a supplied text string.

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Split a String in Excel Page 2 of 4

In the example below, the Right function returns the last two
characters of the string "test string":

=RIGHT( "test string", 2 ) returns the text string "ng"

Split a String at the First Occurrence of a Specified Character

If you want to split an excel text string at the first occurrence of a specified
character, (e.g. at the first space), there is no built-in Excel function to do
this. However, you can perform this task using the Left, Mid or Right
functions, combined with other built-in Excel functions.

The other Excel functions that you may find useful when splitting a string at
a specified position are:

Find - Returns the position of a sub-string within a supplied string

(case-sensitive).

Search - Returns the position of a sub-string within a supplied string

(not case-sensitive).

Len - Returns the length of a supplied text string.

Note that the only difference between the Find and Search functions is that
the Find function is case-sensitive, while the Search function is not.

Split String at a Specific Character - Examples

Example 1 - Return Text From the Beginning of a Text String, Up
to the First Space
If you want to use a formula to split a text string at the first space,
and then return the left part of the split string, this can be done by
combining the Left function with the Find function. This is shown in
the example below:

A B
1 test string =LEFT( A1, FIND( " ", A1 ) ­ 1 ) ­ returns the result "test"

In the above formula, the Find function returns the value 5 as the
position of the space within the supplied text "test string".
Subtracting 1 from this value gives the value 4, which is then
supplied to the Left function.

Example 2 - Return Text From the End of a Text String

If you want to use a formula to split a text string at the first space,
and then return the right (the end) part of the string, this can be
done by combining the Right function with the Excel Find function
and the Excel Len function. This is shown in the example below:

A B
1 test string =RIGHT( A1, LEN( A1 ) ­ FIND( " ", A1 ) ) ­ returns the result "string"

In the above formula, the Len function returns the value 11, as the
length of the string "test string" and the Find function returns the
value 5 as the position of the space.

Therefore, the expression LEN( A1 ) - FIND( " ", A1 ) evaluates to 6 (=

11 - 5), which is then supplied to the Right function.

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Split a String in Excel Page 3 of 4

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Therefore, the Right function returns the last 6 characters of the

supplied string.

Split a String at the N'th Occurrence of a Specified Character

The problem with the Excel Find and Search functions is that they can only
be used to find the first occurrence of a specified character (or string of
characters), after a specified start position. So what can you do if you want
to split your string at the N'th space?

One way to find the position of the N'th occurrence of a character is to use
the Excel Substitute function, combined with the Excel Find or Search
function.

The Substitute function substitutes the N'th occurrence of a specified

string, with a second supplied string. The Find function can then be used to
return the position of your substitute string, and this position can then be
supplied to the Left, Mid or Right function.

An example of this is provided below.

Split String at the N'th Occurrence of a Specified Character -

Example
In this example, we return the left part of the original text string "An
example text string", up to the third space. For clarity, we will first
break the formula down into 3 stages:

Formula broken down into 3 stages:

A
1 An example text string
2 =SUBSTITUTE( A1, " ", "|", 3 )
3 =FIND( "|", A2 )
4 =LEFT( A1, A3 ­ 1 )
­ returns the result "An example text|string"
­ returns the result "16"
­ returns the result "An example text"

In the first stage of the above formula, we have substituted the

third space with the character "|". The reason for choosing this
character is that we know it does not occur in the original text.

The three stages shown in cells A2 - A4 of the above spreadsheet

above return the left part of the original text string, up to the third
space. If you are confident with Excel formulas, you may prefer to
combine these three stages into a single formula, as shown below:

A single formula:
A
1 An example text string
2 =LEFT( A1, FIND( "|", SUBSTITUTE( A1, " ", "|", 3 ) ) ­ 1 ) ­ returns the result "An example text"

http://www.excelfunctions.net/split-string-in-excel.html 5/23/2018