Format numbers in a spreadsheet

To apply a custom date or time format to your spreadsheet:

1. On your computer, open a spreadsheet in Google Sheets.
2. Highlight the data you want to format.
3. Click Format Number.
4. Click Custom date and time.
5. Search in the menu text box to select a format. You can also add your own custom date or time format into the text box.
6. Click Apply.

By default, the time and date options that surface will be based on your spreadsheet locale.

If you want to add more detailed time or date values to your formatting, for example the hour or minute, click the down arrow in the right corner of the menu text box and select an additional value. You can adjust the specific formatting for these values by clicking on the arrows in the value and choosing an option. To delete a value from your formatting, click the value and select Delete.

To apply a custom currency format to your spreadsheet:

To apply a custom number format to your spreadsheet:

1. On your computer, open a spreadsheet in Google Sheets.
2. Highlight the data you want to format.
3. Click Format Number.
4. Click Custom number format.
5. Search in the menu text box to select a format. You can also add your own custom number format into the text box.
6. Click Apply.

When creating a custom format, note that the formatting can consist of up to 4 parts separated by semicolons: positive;negative;zero;non-numeric. Financial formats are also supported.

You can use colors in the formatting, for example to differentiate between positive and negative numbers, by adding a color in brackets (for example, [Red]) anywhere within the desired part of the format. Formatting colors must be used in English. The colors that can be used are:

• Black
• White
• Red
• Blue
• Green
• Magenta
• Yellow
• Cyan
• Color# (where # is replaced by a number between 1-56 to choose from a different variety of colors)

Here is a list of common syntax characters that can be used to create a custom number format: