Hi. In this Excel tutorial, we’ll go over how to use the CONVERT function in Excel. The CONVERT function helps you convert values
from one measurement to another. There are several options available, and some common ones are for weight and mass, distance,
speed, time and temperature, but there are many others. And, by the way, if you find this tutorial helpful, please make sure to click Like
and subscribe to the channel so you can catch new tutorials right as they come out. We really appreciate it.
So, before we get going, it's important to know that the CONVERT function is made up of 3 key inputs. You'll need:
the value that you want to convert,
the measurement that you want to convert that value from,
and the measurement that you want to convert that value to. On my spreadsheet, I used the CONVERT function and some color to create a
sort of conversion calculator. All I need to do is update the measurements
and my input values, if I need to, so that it calculates. And, honestly, the trickiest part of using the CONVERT formula is to remember
what abbreviations to use for the different measurements.
I'll include a link in the description that you can reference for this. So, to recreate this, I'm going
to highlight 6 cells and then format them as a Table using one of the preset formats.
And I'm only doing this to save time with formatting, so right away I'm going to convert it back to a range.
So, we'll lay this out with the value we want to convert on the left and the corresponding measurements along the top. In the first
example, we'll convert a Fahrenheit temperature to Celsius. So, we'll label this with a capital F
and the far right header with a capital C. So, a couple of quick notes here: 1. the case that you use is important. It has to match
what's in the list of measurements in Excel, otherwise the calculation will not work. In this
example, both labels will need to be capitalized because
the Fahrenheit and Celsius measurement abbreviations are both capitalized. So, in this case, our function will not work if I were to type
the F or C in lowercase. And 2. a quirky thing I've found is that when referencing cells in the
CONVERT function, like we are here, quotation marks are not necessary.
But, if you are not referencing cells, you will need to type the abbreviations for the measurements in quotation marks just like they
show on the list. So, let's use 80° for our Fahrenheit measurement, and we'll type an equal sign here, just to make it easier to see
what's happening, and then we'll insert the CONVERT function here, in this cell.
So, we simply type =CONVERT, and then we'll select the cell that we want to convert from, which in this case will be the 80°.
Next, we need to select the measurement that we want to convert from, which is the F, here, for Fahrenheit
and, lastly, we select the measurement that we want to convert to - which will be the cell with the C for Celsius, and close our parentheses.
And, so, we get that 80° F equals 26.6667° C.
So, like I mentioned earlier, the case has to match what's in the list that Excel has. So, notice if I were to type the F for Fahrenheit in
lower case, our formula no longer works. The only exception where you can deviate from this list is
certain prefixes that we can add to help calculate the measurements.
These'll also be included in the reference list that I'll link to in the description. So, let's say we want to convert speeds from miles per hour
to kilometers per hour. So, we'll change this to mph, but then notice how we only have a meters per hour. If we were to add a "k" for
thousands before the "m," it'll calculate this as km/h. If you enjoyed this tutorial on
how to use the CONVERT function in Microsoft Excel, please make sure to Like the video and don’t forget to subscribe to this channel.
Thanks!