Excel 2024: Convert Text Numbers to Numbers Quickly

It sometimes happen that you end up with a long column of numbers stored as text and you need to convert those to real numbers.

During 2020, the logic behind Convert to Number was rewritten. In the past, using this feature could take minutes, as Excel would recalculate the worksheet after each cell was converted to a number. Today, however, it is super-fast. Simply select the range of cells where the first cell is a number stored as text. An on-grid drop-down will appear to the left of the top text number. Open the drop-down menu and choose Convert to Number.

Note that this option only appears if you have File, Options, Formula set to these:

Before Convert to Number was rewritten, my favorite method of converting Text Numbers would be to select the column of text numbers and press Alt+D E F. This would run the column through the defaults of Text to Columns.

For completeness, there is a third method. Select a blank cell and enter the number 1. Copy the 1 to the clipboard. Then select the cells with text numbers. From the Paste drop-down menu, choose Paste Special. In the Paste Special dialog, choose both Values and Multipy. When you multiply the 1 times text numbers, they will convert to real numbers. You can also copy any blank cell and then Paste Special Add. This adds a zero to the text numbers.