Calculations with Date in Excel

Pradeep Kumar Excel Formula Tips

Dates function also be used to subtract the Year, Month and Days from the existing dates. Sometimes we need to subtract specific period from the date. In case you are working on large database, this become tedious job for calculating date difference

Here we discussed the various scenarios where we can subtract the period from the dates. These are the simple formulas which will help you to perform these calculations with just few steps

How to add and subtract dates, days, weeks, months and years in Excel

Subtracting Years from Date:

We can subtract any number of years from the existing date and as part of example we will be following below Syntax to subtract the “5” years from the date

Syntax: =DATE(YEAR(A2)-5,MONTH(A2),DAY(A2))

In the above example, we are subtracting 5 years from 19^th Sep 2019 and output will be 19^th Sep 2014 (i.e. Year 2019 (-) 5 Years= 2014)

Addition Years in Date:

Adding Years in Dates: Below Syntax will be used to add “5” Years in the existing date

Syntax: =DATE(YEAR(A2)+5,MONTH(A2),DAY(A2))

In the above example, we are adding 5 years in 19^th Sep 2019 and output will be 19^th Sep 2024 (i.e. Year 2019 + 5 Years= 2024)

Subtracting Months from Date:

Below Syntax will be used to subtract “5” months from the date

Syntax: =DATE(YEAR(A2),MONTH(A2)-5,DAY(A2))

In the above example, we are subtracting 5 months from 19^th Sep 2019 and output will be 19^th April 2019 (i.e. Sep Month (i.e. 9^th Month) -5 Months= April (i.e. 4^th Month))

Adding Months in Date:

Below Syntax will be used to add “5” months in the date

Syntax =DATE(YEAR(A2),MONTH(A2)+5,DAY(A2))

In the above example, we are adding 5 months in 19^th Sep 2019 and output will be 19^th Feb 2020 (i.e. Sep Month (i.e. 9^th Month) +5 Months= Feb (i.e. 2^th Feb of next year))

Subtracting Days from Date:

Below Syntax will be used to subtract “5” days from the date

Syntax: =DATE(YEAR(A2),MONTH(A2),DAY(A2)-5)

In the above example, we are subtracting 5 days from 19^th Sep 2019 and output will be 14^th Sep 2019 (i.e. 19^th Sep -5 Days= 14^th Sep)

Adding Days in Date:

Below Syntax will be used to add “5” days in the date

Syntax =DATE(YEAR(A2),MONTH(A2),DAY(A2)+5)

In the above example, we are adding 5 days in 19^th Sep 2019 and output will be 24^th Sep 2019 (i.e. 19^th Sep +5 Days= 24^th Sep)

TIP:
You can add or subtract years, months, days with combination i.e. if you want to subtract the year or month together. Then just subtract the value from respective parameter. You can also make these days, months, years as variable. In that case, just link the cell from which you want to add or subtract the years, months, days. Read more about Date Function to understand the parameters

How to calculate the difference between two dates?

Calculating days between two different dates are most common function that is used in Microsoft excel. I saw many users tries various complex method to calculate the difference but this is really a simple math calculations

We just need to place an excel formula i.e. “= Latest Date – Oldest Date”