Extract usernames from E-mail IDs [using LEFT and FIND formulas in Excel]

Share

Facebook
Twitter
LinkedIn

Extract usernames from E-mail IDs [using LEFT and FIND formulas in Excel]Today we will learn to use Excel’s LEFT and FIND formulas. But what fun it is to learn a new formula on a Tuesday?

So, we will actually learn to use these formulas to solve the problem: “extract the username from an email ID”

How is an email ID structured?

Any email ID contains 2 parts – user name and domain name.

For eg. in my email id – chandoo.d@gmail.com – chandoo.d is user name and gmail.com is domain.

So how do we get the user name out?

As you can see, username always starts at left and goes up to the symbol “@”. So, If we write a formula to fetch all the characters up to “@” symbol, it will get us the user name.

This is where LEFT() and FIND() formulas enter the scene.

What does Excel LEFT formula do?

Excel LEFT formula will let you cut a portion of text from left. For eg. =LEFT("Long",2) will give you Lo. (syntax and examples)

So, to get the email username, we need to get all the letters in the left of email ID up to the location of “@” symbol. And how do we find the position of a symbol in a text?

We use FIND formula.

FIND formula gives the location of one text in another. For eg. =FIND("do", "chandoo") will give us 5 (the location of “do” in “chandoo”).

FIND will throw an error (#VALUE!) if the text you are trying to find is not available. For eg. =FIND("peace", "world") will throw #VALUE!

(syntax and examples)

Armed with these 2 formulas, now let us get that user name out of email ID

Assuming cell A1 has the email id, the formula for getting user name is =LEFT(A1,FIND("@",A1)-1)

We have to use -1 as find actually tells the position of “@” and we need all the letters up to “@”, but not “@”.

This is how it works:

Extract usernames from E-mail IDs - demo

Your homework:

  • How would you extract the domain out of email ID? (Hint: there is a right formula for everything)

Use comments to write your answers. Don’t cheat.

Learn more excel formulas:

Facebook
Twitter
LinkedIn

Share this tip with your colleagues

Excel and Power BI tips - Chandoo.org Newsletter

Get FREE Excel + Power BI Tips

Simple, fun and useful emails, once per week.

Learn & be awesome.

Welcome to Chandoo.org

Thank you so much for visiting. My aim is to make you awesome in Excel & Power BI. I do this by sharing videos, tips, examples and downloads on this website. There are more than 1,000 pages with all things Excel, Power BI, Dashboards & VBA here. Go ahead and spend few minutes to be AWESOME.

Read my storyFREE Excel tips book

Overall I learned a lot and I thought you did a great job of explaining how to do things. This will definitely elevate my reporting in the future.
Rebekah S
Reporting Analyst
Excel formula list - 100+ examples and howto guide for you

From simple to complex, there is a formula for every occasion. Check out the list now.

Calendars, invoices, trackers and much more. All free, fun and fantastic.

Advanced Pivot Table tricks

Power Query, Data model, DAX, Filters, Slicers, Conditional formats and beautiful charts. It's all here.

Still on fence about Power BI? In this getting started guide, learn what is Power BI, how to get it and how to create your first report from scratch.

13 Responses to “Convert fractional Excel time to hours & minutes [Quick tip]”

  1. Debraj Roy says:

    Hi Purna..

    Again a great tip.. Its a great way to convert Fractional Time..
    By the way.. Excel has two great and rarely used formula..

    =DOLLARFR(7.8,60) and =DOLLARDE(7.48,60)

    basically US Account person uses those to convert some currency denomination.. and we can use it to convert Year(i.e 3.11 Year = 3 year 11 month) and Week(6.5 week = 6 week 5 days), in the same manner...

  2. Jason says:

    This doesn't work for me. When applying the custom format of [h]:mm to 7.8 I get 187:12

    Any ideas why?

    • Hui... says:

      @Jason
      7.8 in Excel talk means 7.8 days
      =7.8*24
      =187.2 Hrs
      =187 Hrs 12 Mins

      If you follow Chandoo's instructions you will see that he divides the 7.8 by 24 to get it to a fraction of a day

      Simple, assuming the fractional time is in cell A1,

      Use below steps to convert it to hours & minutes:

      1. In the target cell, write =A1/24
      2. Select the target cell and press CTRL+1 to format it (you can also right click and select format cells)
      3. Select Custom from “Number” tab and enter the code [h]:mm
      4. Done!

  3. WhoKnows says:

    Hi, sorry to point this out but Column C Header is misspelt 'Hours Palyed'

  4. abhishek malik says:

    good one

  5. Julia says:

    So how do I go the other way and get hours and minutes to fractional time?

    • Chandoo says:

      If you have 7.5 in cell A1,

      - Use int(A1) to get the hours.
      - Use mod(A1,1)*60 to get minutes.

      If you have 7:30 (formatted as time) in A1

      - Use hours(a1) to get hours
      - Use minutes(a1) to get minutes.

      • Paula says:

        I had the same issue. You can solve it by changing the format as described above:

        Right click cell > Format Cells > (In Number tab) > Custom > Then enter the code [h]:mm
        ([hh]:mm and [hhh]:mm are nice too if you want to show leading zeros)

        • Jack Scarce says:

          Thanks guys, these are the tips I'm looking for.
          ...dividing the number of minutes elapsed by the percent change is my task - "int" is the key this time

  6. Srikanth says:

    It doesnt work for greater than 24 hours
    It returns 1:30 for 25.5 hours. It should have returned 25:30

    Ideally I would right function as
    =QUOTIENT(A1,1)&":"&MOD(A1,1)*60

    • Paula says:

      Sorry, replied to wrong comment....

      ----
      I had the same issue. You can solve it by changing the format as described above:

      Right click cell > Format Cells > (In Number tab) > Custom > Then enter the code [h]:mm
      ([hh]:mm and [hhh]:mm are nice too if you want to show leading zeros)

  7. Daniel says:

    Clever use of MOD here to extract the decimal part of a number. Divide a number containing a decimal by 1 and return the remainder. Humm. Very clever.

  8. Tomer says:

    Thanks very much, extremely useful !

Leave a Reply