How many days until the end of the year? How many days until the big meeting? Use this simple Excel countdown formula to find out.
The DATEVALUE formula converts a date into a number in Microsoft Excel date-time code. This allows you to do simple math with days and time and create an Excel countdown formula.
=DATEVALUE(“31-March-2012″)-TODAY()&” days until final numbers are due”
The red section of the code does the math needed, and the blue section of the code adds “Days until Final numbers are due” to the cell. I included this to force Excel to use a number instead of printing the results in Date Time Format.
If you don’t want a simple number instead, remove the blue section of the code. Then change the number format under the Home tab to “Number”.

There are a few other applications for this beyond a simple Excel countdown formula too.
 
 

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