How To Calculate Elapsed Time Using Excel Formulas?

How to Calculate Elapsed Time using Excel Formulas? https://chandoo.
org/wp/elapsed-time-excel/
! Excel Howtos, Learn Excel
Calculate Elapsed Time in Excel [Quick

Tips]
Last updated on September 22, 2009
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1 of 21 23/3/21, 12:40 am
How to Calculate Elapsed Time using Excel Formulas? https://chandoo.org/wp/elapsed-time-excel/
date and time from which we need to calculate elapsed

Welcome to Chandoo.org
time is in Cell A1.
Thank you so much for visiting. My aim
To calculate the elapsed time in years, use the formula is to make you awesome in Excel &
Power BI. I do this by sharing videos,
=(NOW()-A1)/365 [Help on NOW formula] tips, examples and downloads on this
website. There are more than 1,000
Elapsed time in months pages with all things Excel, Power BI,
Dashboards & VBA here. Go ahead and
To calculate the elapsed time in months, we can use the spend few minutes to be AWESOME.
formula =(NOW()-A1)/30. This returns the value in 30
Read my story • FREE Excel tips
day months. book
Elapsed time in weeks
To calculate the elapsed time in weeks, we use the
formula =(NOW()-A1)/7
Elapsed time in days
To calculate elapsed time in days, the formula is simple =TODAY()-A1. [Help on TODAY formula]
The result includes fractions as well. You can use number formatting to remove the values after
decimal point.
Elapsed time in working days Want an AWESOME

To calculate elapsed time in working days, we can use the NETWORKDAYS formula like this =
Excel Class?
NETWORKDAYS(A1, TODAY()). This formula assumes 5 working days per week starting with Monday.
You can also add an optional list of holidays as a parameter to it.
2 of 21 23/3/21, 12:40 am
But if your working week is not from Monday to Friday, you can try the NETWORKINGDAYS() UDF
Excel School made me great at ⋆!
! ⋆!⋆!
⋆
in the same way.
work. ⋆
!
Elapsed time in hours
– Brenda
To calculate elapsed time in hours, we can use the formula =(NOW()-A1)*24
Elapsed time in minutes
To find out elapsed time in minutes, use the formula =(NOW()-A1)*24*60
Elapsed time in seconds

FREE Goodies for you...
In some machine critical scenarios, you might want to find the elapsed time in seconds. Just use the
formula =(NOW()-A1)*24*3600
Download the Elapsed Time Worksheet and see the examples
Click here to download the elapsed time worksheet and play with the examples.
More:
Tips on using date & time in excel, List of excel date & time formulas, More excel quick
tips
100 Excel Formulas List
3 of 21 23/3/21, 12:40 am
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! 41 Comments
# Ask a question or say something...
! Tagged under date and time, downloads, Excel Howtos, Learn Excel, Microsoft Excel Formulas,
networkdays(), networkingdays(), now(), quick tip, spreadsheets, today(), tutorials
! Category: Excel Howtos, Learn Excel
4 of 21 23/3/21, 12:40 am
5 of 21 23/3/21, 12:40 am
6 of 21 23/3/21, 12:40 am
Advanced Data Viz with Excel – Live What is XLOOKUP? 13 formula examples
Event on 26 March to really understand it
7 of 21 23/3/21, 12:40 am
How to embed Excel files, calculators on Dynamic Arrays Live Masterclass –

your website? – Step by step Replay
instructions
8 of 21 23/3/21, 12:40 am
on of its use in Chip Pearson's site :
2.
5 Simple & Useful Conditional Image Lookup – How-to show dynamic
Formatting Tricks picture in a cell [Excel Trick]
Reply
3. L. Quezada says:
September 22, 2009 at 5:31 pm
Oliver:
Yes, I think that DATEDIFF do it better.
Reply
4. Andy says:
Great post! This a fantastic tutorial on calculating elapsed time in Excel that could be helpful even
to a novice user. Keep up the useful tips!
Also, the Office community on Facebook could really benefit from you knowledge! Check it out at
http://www.facebook.com/office
Cheers,
Andy
MSFT Office Outreach Team
9 of 21 23/3/21, 12:40 am
for minutes : [m] ==>2793212

for seconds : [s] ==> 167592763
We can also use mean duration for years (orbital period of the Earth around the Sun : i-e tropical
year) which is : 365.25 days
and mean duration for month : 365.25/12 days
be Excelent !!!!
Reply
6. Chandoo says:
September 23, 2009 at 8:57 am
@Oliver... Thanks for the pointer to datediff(). I will update the post with information about this
as well.
@Glen... thanks for the linklove
@Andy... Welcome. Thanks for telling us about the office community on FB.
@Modeste ... that is very cool. I will remember these formatting codes for an upcoming article on
number formatting codes
Reply
7. Tony says:
Great tip Chandoo! I use the formula to calculate years elapsed all the time. It can seriously help
save a ton of time with calculations. Also, NETWORKDAYS is one that helps and can seriously
impress a boss. Keep up the great work here!
Reply
8. Andy says:
10 of 21 23/3/21, 12:40 am
Hi,
always great posts and a good way to start my day
but regarding the elapsed time calculations: have you never noticed that there is a result
difference between using =TODAY()-A1 and using =NETWORKDAYS(A1,TODAY())?
try it for A1= a Monday such as 21sep09 and "today" is e.g. a Thursday; you get 3 or 4
respectively as a result, depending on the formula used; this is because formula =networkdays()
always includes both the startdate and the end date and not only the time between these 2.
This is easily corrected/compensated bij always adding a -1 to the =networkdays() formula
because the majority of us will count startday as day 0 and then the result will be consistent
across the different formulas.
However, you then get into trouble if you calculate the networkdays for a date further in the past
and where either the start or end date falls in a weekend.
just thought to point this out as to me these formula's are not interchangeable just like that!
have a great day!

Paul
Reply
10. Captn_zee says:

April 26, 2011 at 8:45 am
=DATEDIF([DOJ],TODAY(),"Y") & " Y, " & DATEDIF([DOJ],TODAY(),"YM") & " M, " &
DATEDIF([DOJ],TODAY(),"MD") & " D"
This will fix your 30 Days problem
Reply
11. Amol says:

January 17, 2012 at 5:46 am
I calculated the time diff between two date+ times by subtracting 2 cells & custom formatted it
to "d hh:mm" format.
11 of 21 23/3/21, 12:40 am
Hui... says:
@Amol
Try the Custom Format code:
[<1] hh:mm ; [>=1] d “d” hh:mm
Reply
12. Ana says:

February 16, 2012 at 3:52 pm
Hi Chandoo,
If possible to compute the interval of time and date in one column.

In column C I would like to compute the total days and hours . What formula ? Please help
Example.
Column A Column B
2/13/12 3:30 AM 2/14/12 12:00 AM
Reply
13. Prasad DN says:

March 1, 2012 at 8:12 pm
In referenc to Elapsed time in months
To calculate the elapsed time in months, we can use the formula =(NOW()-A1)/30. This returns
the value in 30 day months.
I use to apply formula =ROUND((TODAY()-A1)/30,0). Today, I faced a peculiar situation, A1 has

date 01-Mar-2009, and today being 01-Mar-2012, it should be 36 months, but it is showing 37
months!!
Any suggestions to avoid such errors?
Regards,
12 of 21 23/3/21, 12:40 am
Reply
Hui says:
April 15, 2012 at 1:24 am
@Pete
I use Excel 2010 and it still works
The times must be entered as times in the format hh:mm:ss or hh:mm without seconds
Adding up times is as simple as =Sum(Range) or =Sum(A2:A10)
then using a Custom Number format as you have mentioned [h]:mm
If this isn't working, 2 ideas

1. Check your times are times and not text
2. Can you share your data or file with us?
Reply
15. Kent in Wichita says:

July 13, 2012 at 6:19 pm
My hospital tracks times from patient arrival to various procedures or treatments. When those
times cross over midnight, the regular formulas (2nd time minus first time) don’t work because
the result is negative and Excel (2007) won’t show a negative number in time format.
I couldn’t find a solution here (chandoo.org) but found one elsewhere that worked and it’s very
simple. I would like to share it.
Assuming 1st time in A1 (column for patient arrival time) (11:00 PM), and 2nd time in B1
(column for x-ray given) (12:30 AM)). Should be 1:30 elapsed time.
=B1-A1+(B1<A1) [This comparison is the key to the solution.]
=12:30 AM – 11:00 PM + (12:30 AM < 11:00 PM)
=0.0208 – 0.9583 + (True)
=-0.9375 + (1) [This is the key! If it is false, Excel adds 0. If it’s true, Excel adds 1 and that is
what corrects the negative number. Now Excel can interpret the number as a time.]
=0.0625
Converted to hh:mm = 1:30
I wrapped this formula inside an IFERROR one to alert my data entry person if she messed up
13 of 21 23/3/21, 12:40 am
Reply
16. shashidhar says:

December 9, 2012 at 1:57 pm
HI,
I am working on a Xl application..
I want to capture time between two clicks.
Ex, in my application during run somewhere I press OK button and then I click Cancel.. I want to
measure time between these two clicks... Is it possible??
Pls help on this...
Reply
Hui says:
December 10, 2012 at 1:31 am
@shashidhar
The answer is Yes
You will have to add an appropriate VBA event to start and stop a timer.
There are techniques which can time to the millisecond so maybe look those up on the net
Reply
17. William W. says:

October 30, 2013 at 5:16 am
WOW!!!!!! I truly love your excel time format program! WHOOOO! I am very interested in how
the time formats "update" (manually on a physical keyboard) that "updates" the time into its
respective decimal time formats, such as:
YYYY.yyyy, HH.hhh, etc...
How do those formulas or equations work if not in Excel mode? Example: TI calculators, Word, or
14 of 21 23/3/21, 12:40 am
December 24, 2013 at 1:48 pm
Regarding the elapsed time in months:

I made this function to determine the time elapsed since a date using the number of days in each
respective month. It's a simple subtraction and I think it works very well:((Year Today-Year
A1)*12++(Month Today - Month A1)+(Day Today/Days in Month Today)-Days A1/Days in month
A1)
Here's the function:

=((YEAR(TODAY())-YEAR(A1))*12)+(MONTH(TODAY())-MONTH(A1))+
(DAY(TODAY())/DAY(DATE(YEAR(TODAY()),MONTH(TODAY())+1,0))-DAY(A1)
/DAY(DATE(YEAR(A1),MONTH(A1)+1,0)))
Have a Merry Christmas everyone!!
Reply
19. Christian says:

I need the ability to calculate how much progress we have made between two dates and I want
to represent that as a percentage.
I am thinking this would be a combination of today, networkdays & dividing the days elapsed vs
the total days. Then it should be as easy as formatting my cell. Any help would be greatly
appreciated.
Reply
Hui... says:
@Christian
Your correct
dates are just numbers and so you can use simple math to derive the percentage
=(Date Now-Start Date)/(End date-Start date)
that will give you a number between 0 and 1
which you can format as a %'age
15 of 21 23/3/21, 12:40 am
I want to calculate the timelapse taking into consideration the day begin and dayend time.
If the work begins and ends the same day, a simple formula b1-a1 would compute the
productivity.
But if the process remains incomplete and is carried over to the next day, then timelines to be
computed accordingly
to clarify,
if start time of an activity is 03/15/2015 18:00 hrs and end time is 03/16/2015 11:00 hrs, then
the resultant formula should be 5 hrs (ie 18:00 to 20:00 hrs on day1 + 08:00 to 11:00 hrs on
day2) ie 2+3
please guide.
Reply
Kent in Wichita says:

March 18, 2015 at 3:12 pm
Venkatesh, try (b1-a1)-0.5
This will subtract the fixed amount of time between shifts, 12 hours. If the time between
shifts varies, then you could reference other cells that contain the variables.
Reply
21. aria says:

March 25, 2015 at 12:56 pm
Please help. when I use the networking days formula I get a date (2-may-00) I want actual
number of days. I managing projects and I need to know how many days have passed since we
received a project to the current date. Please help Thanks
Reply
Chandoo says:
16 of 21 23/3/21, 12:40 am
Reply
23. modeste says:

June 1, 2015 at 8:28 am
Hi folks ...
calculating age in years , months and days
=text(now()-a1,"yy")&" y " &text(now()-a1,"mm")-1 &" m "&text(now()-a1,"dd") & " d"
Reply
24. Dan S says:

June 2, 2015 at 9:11 pm
Hi, the Elapsed time in days [ =TODAY()-A1 ] works great however, if I do not have a date in A1,
it shows 42157. Anyway to get it to display 0 or a Null value?
Reply
Hui... says:
June 3, 2015 at 1:11 am
@Dan
=If(A1="",0,TODAY()-A1)
Reply
Dan S says:
June 8, 2015 at 5:45 pm
I get #NAME? and the formula does not work.
Reply
25. Veena says:

November 13, 2015 at 9:37 pm
17 of 21 23/3/21, 12:40 am
4) Work week is Mon through Friday.
Can you help?
Thanks!
Reply
26. zaidan says:

March 16, 2017 at 10:47 am
Hi, i have a certain name (wilium) in column A and against this name i have 2 option, 1 Done
and 2 Inprogress. i want that i count done again wilium and count inprogress against wilium
separately. which formula will work for it??
Reply
27. zaidan says:

March 16, 2017 at 10:48 am
Hi, i have a certain name (wilium) in column A and against this name i have 2 option, 1 Done
and 2 Inprogress in column C. i want that i count done again wilium and count inprogress against
wilium separately. which formula will work for it??
Reply
28. Augustine Boltz says:

March 20, 2018 at 1:50 am
Year, month, day results for DoB.

The formulas I have found on the net and the datedif function do not work. This is what I came
up with using a Microsoft support paper dated April 1997 with some modifications:
IF(OR(A2>$A$1,ISBLANK(A2)),"",IF(YEAR($A$1)=YEAR(A2),0,IF(MONTH($A$1)>=MONTH(A2),YEAR($A$1)-
YEAR(A2),YEAR($A$1)-YEAR(A2)-1))&" years "&MONTH($A$1)-
MONTH(A2)+IF(AND(MONTH($A$1)<=MONTH(A2),DAY($A$1)
<DAY(A2)),11,IF(AND(MONTH($A$1)=DAY(A2)),12,IF(AND(MONTH($A$1)>MONTH(A2),DAY($A$1)=DAY(A2),ABS(DAY($A$1)-
DAY(A2)),DAY(EOMONTH(A2,0))-DAY(A2)+DAY($A$1))&" days")
18 of 21 23/3/21, 12:40 am
calculating age in years , months and days

=YEAR(NOW()-DoB)-1900 & " y " & MONTH(NOW()-DoB)-1 & " m " & DAY(NOW()-DoB) &
" d"
Reply
29. Jenna says:

July 29, 2018 at 11:02 am
Hi Chandoo,
I am looking for help with the elapse time formula. I have a recruitment tracking sheet where we
track the number of days the positions are opened, and when they are finally closed.
The opened positions will have a running turnaround time (TAT) formula and I am using this
formula:
=NETWORKDAYS (start_date, TODAY (), Holidays2018)
Now, without disrupting the running TAT formula, how do I then get the TAT to stop when we
have a final end date? All the information below is row:
- start_date --> Cell A
- TODAY () --> cell B
- end_date --> Cell C
Hope you are able to help. Thanks!
Reply
Chandoo says:
July 29, 2018 at 10:08 pm
Interesting question. Try this:
=NETWORKDAYS (start_date, if(end_date <>"", end_date, TODAY ()), Holidays2018)
Reply
30. Athena says:
19 of 21 23/3/21, 12:40 am
20 of 21 23/3/21, 12:40 am
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How to Calculate Elapsed Time using Excel Formulas? https://chandoo.

! Excel Howtos, Learn Excel

Calculate Elapsed Time in Excel [Quick

date and time from which we need to calculate elapsed

Elapsed time in weeks

To calculate the elapsed time in weeks, we use the

Elapsed time in days

Elapsed time in working days Want an AWESOME

You can also add an optional list of holidays as a parameter to it.

Elapsed time in hours

Elapsed time in minutes

To find out elapsed time in minutes, use the formula =(NOW()-A1)*24*60

Elapsed time in seconds

Download the Elapsed Time Worksheet and see the examples

100 Excel Formulas List

Your first name

Your email address

Get FREE Excel + Power BI Tips

Learn & be awesome.

13 Advanced Pivot Table Skills

! Category: Excel Howtos, Learn Excel

How to embed Excel files, calculators on Dynamic Arrays Live Masterclass –

on of its use in Chip Pearson's site :

Yes, I think that DATEDIFF do it better.

for minutes : [m] ==>2793212

@Glen... thanks for the linklove

have a great day!

10. Captn_zee says:

This will fix your 30 Days problem

11. Amol says:

12. Ana says:

If possible to compute the interval of time and date in one column.

13. Prasad DN says:

In referenc to Elapsed time in months

I use to apply formula =ROUND((TODAY()-A1)/30,0). Today, I faced a peculiar situation, A1 has

Any suggestions to avoid such errors?

If this isn't working, 2 ideas

15. Kent in Wichita says:

16. shashidhar says:

17. William W. says:

December 24, 2013 at 1:48 pm

Regarding the elapsed time in months:

Here's the function:

Have a Merry Christmas everyone!!

19. Christian says:

Kent in Wichita says:

Venkatesh, try (b1-a1)-0.5

21. aria says:

23. modeste says:

24. Dan S says:

I get #NAME? and the formula does not work.

25. Veena says:

4) Work week is Mon through Friday.

Can you help?

26. zaidan says:

27. zaidan says:

28. Augustine Boltz says:

Year, month, day results for DoB.

calculating age in years , months and days

29. Jenna says:

Hope you are able to help. Thanks!

Interesting question. Try this:

=NETWORKDAYS (start_date, if(end_date <>"", end_date, TODAY ()), Holidays2018)

To find out elapsed time in minutes, use the formula =(NOW()-A1)2460