Microsoft Excel WORKDAY Function: A Complete Tutorial
The WORKDAY function in Microsoft Excel is a highly productive tool for calculating delivery dates, project deadlines, or any situation where you need to exclude weekends and holidays. By intelligently skipping non-working days, this function simplifies scheduling and ensures accuracy.
Practical Uses
The WORKDAY function is ideal for:
- Project management, to calculate task deadlines that fall on business days.
- Supply chain planning, determining shipping schedules excluding weekend delays.
- Human resources, to calculate employee start dates or probation periods.
Sample Example
Suppose you start a new project on October 2, 2023, and need to finish it in 10 working days, excluding weekends and a public holiday on October 9, 2023. Here’s how you would calculate the end date using the WORKDAY function:
=WORKDAY(DATE(2023, 10, 2), 10, {DATE(2023, 10, 9)})
The formula will return October 16, 2023, as the project’s end date, considering weekends and the specified holiday.
Step-by-Step Guide
- Open an Excel workbook and go to the cell where you want the result.
- Type the
=WORKDAYformula, starting with the project start date as the first argument. - Add the number of working days you want to calculate as the second argument.
- Optionally, include a list of holidays as the third argument, enclosed in curly braces or referring to a range of cells containing holiday dates.
- Press Enter, and the formula will return the calculated end date.
Tips and Tricks
- Ensure all holiday dates in the list are formatted correctly as date values in Excel.
- Use the WORKDAY.INTL function if you need to calculate dates with custom weekend rules (e.g., weekends on Friday and Saturday).
- Double-check that the number of days input is realistic and aligns with your project or task timelines.
Want to further enhance your Excel skills? Explore additional tips and tricks on our YouTube channel, SmartLink Basics!
Watch the detailed video tutorial here:
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