# Getting the month/year in excel



## blaqDeaph

Hi,

I know that it's posible to get today's date using the TODAY() function, but is there a way to parse that result and get only the month and year seperately? If I choose formatting other than DATE i get a string of numbers, that I'm unable to make heads or tails of what it means.


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## OBP

Try 
=MONTH(TODAY())
=Year(TODAY())


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## cristobal03

The "string of numbers" represents the floating-point value that corresponds to today's date. Most applications store date information as referential instances in time rather than literal dates. I think the reference point for Microsoft applications is December 30, 1899. So, the number you saw was the number of days it has been since that date. The integer portion represents days; the precision portion represents a fraction of the current day (i.e., hours, minutes, and seconds).

Just some info.

chris.


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## Zack Barresse

In Excel, 1 = January 1, 1900; this is using the 1900 date system. So 1.5 would be January 1, 1900 12:00 pm (noon). Today (April 25, 2006) would be 38,832. They are called Serial Numbers. The 1904 date system was designed for use with a Mac and differs slightly.


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## blaqDeaph

OKz, Thanks for the info, I will use the functions to parse and extract the month/year


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## blaqDeaph

Heres an interesting, note. If thats the case, then

=int(today()/365.25)+1900 should return the year correct? For me it returns 2017


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## bomb #21

Break it down. Do you get 106.319 for *=TODAY()/365.25*? Or 106 for *=INT(TODAY()/365.25)*?

Re: 'parse and extract the month/year' ; do you need the actual values or just for display purposes? If the latter, can't you just use *=TODAY()* with custom formats (*MMMM* or *YYYY*)?


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## Zack Barresse

Hmm, should be 2006 and 2002 for 1904 date system.

What do you get when you type this ...

=YEAR(TODAY())

?? If you still get the same answer, check your system Date/Time from your control panel.


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## blaqDeaph

Nah, turns out it was my error. And my version of excel counts from 1 Jan 1900, since when I put 0 as the serial number thats what I get.

Thanks for all your help guys!


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## Zack Barresse

I'd be willing to be that you would get the same result if you put a 0 *or* a 1 as a serial number and checked the date.


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