Have you ever worked with messy text in Excel — names in ALL CAPS, lowercase addresses, or titles that don’t look right?
Don’t worry! Excel gives you 3 simple text functions to clean and format your text properly:
LOWER– Makes everything lowercaseUPPER– Makes everything UPPERCASEPROPER– Makes First Letter of Each Word Capital
Let’s explore them with real-life examples!
Why Use These Functions?
These functions help when:
- You’re copying data from other systems
- Formatting names, emails, locations
- Making your sheets look clean and professional
Syntax for All Three
=
LOWER(text)
=UPPER(text)
=PROPER(text)
Note: Just replace text with a cell reference (like A2) or type text directly.
Example Data
| A (Original Text) | B (LOWER) | C (UPPER) | D (PROPER) |
|---|---|---|---|
| JOHN DOE | =LOWER(A2) → john doe | =UPPER(A2) → JOHN DOE | =PROPER(A2) → John Doe |
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| mumbai, india | mumbai, india | MUMBAI, INDIA | Mumbai, India |
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Tip: You can drag the formula down to apply to a whole list!
Where You Can Use These
- Clean up name lists from messy data sources
- Standardize email addresses using
LOWER(most emails are lowercase)- Format titles and locations with
PROPER- Convert answers to UPPERCASE for ID or code validation
Summary
| Function | What It Does | Example |
|---|---|---|
| LOWER | Converts all text to lowercase | =LOWER("HELLO") → hello |
| UPPER | Converts all text to UPPERCASE | =UPPER("hello") → HELLO |
| PROPER | Capitalizes first letter of each word | =PROPER("hello world") → Hello World |
What’s Next?
In the next post, we’ll learn about the TRIM & SUBSTITUTE Function.