Importing data — How dates are read

A column of dates is read as a column, not one cell at a time. 12/08/2026 is 12 August in Britain and 8 December in the United States, and the cell alone cannot say which. Its neighbours usually can: if any date in the column can only be read one way, such as 13/8 or 25/12/2026, every date in that column is read the same way. • Formats can be mixed within a column. 12/08/2026, Aug 12, 2026-08-13, 13/8 and 14 Aug are all read as dates. • Where nothing in the column settles the order, it follows how dates are written where you are. • A date with no year takes the year of the other dates in its column, or this year if none of them has one. • Dates in an Excel workbook are read from the cell rather than from how it is displayed, so they are right whichever way the workbook shows them.