How to: Use Excel to calculate the shift hours worked

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With Microsoft Excel, you can create a worksheet that figures the hours worked for any shift. Follow these step-by-step instructions.

To calculate in Excel how many hours someone has worked, you can often subtract the start time from the end time to get the difference. But if the work shift spans noon or midnight, simple subtraction won’t cut it.

However, you can easily create an Excel worksheet that correctly figures the hours worked for any shift.

Follow these steps:

  1. In A1, enter Time In.
  2. In B1, enter Time Out.
  3. In C1, enter Hours Worked.
  4. Select A2 and B2, and press [Ctrl]1 to open the Format Cells dialog box.
  5. On the Number tab, select Time from the Category list box, choose 1:30 PM from the Type list box, and click OK.
  6. Right-click C2, and select Format Cells.
  7. On the Number tab, select Time from the Category list box, choose 13:30 from the Type list box, and click OK.
  8. In C2, enter the following formula:

=IF(B2<A2,B2+1,B2)-A2

If you enter 11:00 PM as the Time In and enter 7:00 AM as the Time Out, Excel will display 8, the correct number of hours worked.