How to transpose a values in a row to column using formulas… [Quick tip]

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This is interesting, I am in Columbus to meet one of my college friends. I remember him as a very meticulous person from college days. So it is no surprise when he showed me his massively impressive finance tracker last night. He has been tracking expenses, income, credit card payments and gas (petrol) consumption since 2008. Very impressive indeed.

Then out of blue he said, he has a problem with his spreadsheet. In this own words,

When entering data for credit cards, I use one column per card. But in my report view, I want to show credit card details in rows. How do I do this?

Something like this:

How to transpose a values in a row to column using formulas...

Transposing values in a row to column using formulas

If it is a one time process, my friend can use Paste Special > Transpose feature and be done. But this is no one time business. So lets understand which formula helps us do this.

  1. Lets assume original data is in $F$4:$J$5. Row 4 has card names & Row 5 has amounts.
  2. Wherever you want the out put, just list running numbers (1,2,3….) in a column. Lets say these are in cells D10:D14.
  3. To get the first card name, you can use the formula =INDEX($F$4:$J$4, $D10)
  4. To get the first amount due, use the formula =INDEX($F$5:$J$5, $D10)
  5. Now drag both these formulas down and you are done!

This is good, but I don’t like the extra column…

If that is the case, you can use the ROWS() formula to generate these running numbers for you on the fly. For example,

=INDEX($F$4:$J$4, ROWS($A$1:A1)) would work perfectly.

Learn more about: using ROWS / COLUMNS formula to generate running numbers.

Play with this formula

See the embedded Excel workbook below. Play with the formula.

(alternatives: download the example file or view it online)

How do you transpose values?

I love using INDEX formula. I use it for transposing values, tables, getting a cell value (or reference) from a large table, use it along with MATCH etc. It is a very versatile formula and I keep learning new uses for it.

What about you? Do you transpose values often? What formulas do you use? Please share using comments.

More on transposing your data:

If you like to transpose, wrestle or arm twist your data often, then you are at right place. Chandoo.org has tons of tutorials, material and tricks on this. Start with these:

Also, check out more quick tips.

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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 !

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