by If you are looking for an Excel function to get day of week from date, you've landed on the right page. This tutorial will teach you how to use the WEEKDAY formula in Excel to convert a date to a weekday name, filter, highlight and count weekends or workdays, and more.
There are a variety of functions to work with dates in Excel. The day of week function (WEEKDAY) is particularly useful for planning and scheduling, for example to determine the timeframe of a project and automatically remove weekends from the total. So, let's run through the examples one-at-a-time and see how they can help you cope with various date-related tasks in Excel.
WEEKDAY - Excel function for day of week
The Excel WEEKDAY function is used to return the day of the week from a given date.
The result is an integer, ranging from 1 (Sunday) to 7 (Saturday) by default. If your business logic requires a different enumeration, you can configure the formula to start counting with any other day of week.
The WEEKDAY function is available in all versions of Excel 365 through 2000.
The syntax of the WEEKDAY function is as follows:
Where:
Serial_number (required) - the date that you want to convert to the weekday number. It can be supplied as a serial number representing the date, as a text string in the format that Excel understands, as a reference to the cell containing the date, or by using the DATE function.
Return_type (optional) - determines what day of the week to use as the first day. If omitted, defaults to the Sun-Sat week.
Here is a list of all supported return_type values:
| Return_type | Number returned |
|---|---|
| 1 or omitted | From 1 (Sunday) to 7 (Saturday) |
| 2 | From 1 (Monday) to 7 (Sunday) |
| 3 | From 0 (Monday) to 6 (Sunday) |
| 11 | From 1 (Monday) to 7 (Sunday) |
| 12 | From 1 (Tuesday) to 7 (Monday) |
| 13 | From 1 (Wednesday) to 7 (Tuesday) |
| 14 | From 1 (Thursday) to 7 (Wednesday) |
| 15 | From 1 (Friday) to 7 (Thursday) |
| 16 | From 1 (Saturday) to 7 (Friday) |
| 17 | From 1 (Sunday) to 7 (Saturday) |
Note. The return_type values 11 through 17 were introduced in Excel 2010 and therefore they cannot be used in earlier versions.
Basic WEEKDAY formula in Excel
For starters, let's see how to use the WEEKDAY formula in its simplest form to get the day number from date.
For example, to get the weekday from date in C4 with the default Sunday - Saturday week, the formula is:
=WEEKDAY(C4)
If you have a serial number representing the date (e.g. brought by the DATEVALUE function), you can enter that number directly in the formula:
=WEEKDAY(45658)
Also, you can type the date as a text string enclosed in quotation marks directly in the formula. Just be sure to use the date format that Excel expects and can interpret:
=WEEKDAY("1/1/2025")
Or, supply the source date in a 100% reliable way using the DATE function:
=WEEKDAY(DATE(2025, 1,1))
To use the day mapping other than the default Sun-Sat, enter an appropriate number in the second argument. For example, to start counting days from Monday, the formula is:
=WEEKDAY(C4, 2)
In the image below, all the formulas return the day of the week corresponding to January 1, 2025, which is stored as the number 45658 internally in Excel. Depending on the value set in the second argument, the formulas output different results.
At first sight, it may seem that the numbers returned by the WEEKDAY function have very little practical sense. But let's look at it from a different angle and discuss some formulas that solve real-life tasks.
How to convert Excel date to weekday name
By design, the Excel WEEKDAY function returns the day of the week as a number. To turn the weekday number into the day name, employ the TEXT function.
To get full day names, use the "dddd" format code:
To return abbreviated day names, the format code is "ddd":
For example, to convert the date in A3 to the weekday name, the formula is:
=TEXT(WEEKDAY(A3), "dddd")
Or
=TEXT(WEEKDAY(A3), "ddd")
Please note that in this formula, you should use WEEKDAY with only one argument, serial_number. Do not include return_type, even if your week starts on a day other than Sunday.
Actually, the WEEKDAY function is unnecessary for this formula. The TEXT function alone would work nicely:
=TEXT(A3, "dddd")
Though, we often think of WEEKDAY as the day of week function, which might make this formula easier to remember.
Another possible solution is using WEEKDAY together with the CHOOSE function.
For example, to get an abbreviated weekday name from the date in A3, the formula goes as follows:
=CHOOSE(WEEKDAY(A3),"Sun","Mon","Tus","Wed","Thu","Fri","Sat")
Here, WEEKDAY returns a serial number from 1 (Sun) to 7 (Sat) and CHOOSE selects the corresponding value from the list. Since the date in A3 (Wednesday) corresponds to 4, CHOOSE outputs "Wed", which is the 4th value in the list.
Though the CHOOSE formula is slightly more cumbersome to configure, it provides more flexibility letting you output the day names in any format you want. In the above example, we show the abbreviated day names. Instead, you can deliver full names, custom abbreviations or even day names in a different language.
For more examples, see Excel formula to get day of week from date.
Excel WEEKDAY formula to find and filter workdays and weekends
When dealing with a long list of dates, you may want to know which ones are working days and which are weekends.
To identify weekends and weekdays in Excel, build an IF statement with the nested WEEKDAY function. For example:
=IF(WEEKDAY(A3, 2)<6, "Workday", "Weekend")
This formula goes to cell A3 and is copied down across as many cells as needed.
In the WEEKDAY formula, you set return_type to 2, which corresponds to the Mon-Sun week where Monday is day 1. So, if the weekday number is less than 6 (Monday through Friday), the formula returns "Workday", otherwise - "Weekend".
To filter weekends or workdays, apply Excel filter to your dataset (Data tab > Filter) and select either "Weekend" or "Workday".
In the screenshot below, we have weekdays filtered out, so only weekends are visible:
If some regional office of your organization works on a different schedule where the days of rest are other than Saturday and Sunday, you can easily adjust the WEEKDAY formula to your needs by specifying a different return_type.
For example, to treat Saturday and Monday as weekends, set return_type to 12, so you'll get the "Tuesday (1) to Monday (7)" week type:
=IF(WEEKDAY(A2, 12)<6, "Workday", "Weekend")
How to highlight weekends workdays and in Excel
To spot weekends and workdays in your worksheet at a glance, you can get them automatically shaded in different colors. For this, use the weekday/weekend formula discussed in the previous example with Excel conditional formatting. As the condition is implied, we only need the core WEEKDAY function without the IF wrapper.
To highlight weekends (Saturday and Sunday):
=WEEKDAY($A2, 2)<6
To highlight workdays (Monday - Friday):
=WEEKDAY($A2, 2)>5
Where A2 is the upper-left cell of the selected range.
To set up the conditional formatting rule, the steps are:
- Select the list of dates (A2:A15 in our case).
- On the Home tab, in the Styles group, click Conditional formatting > New Rule.
- In the New Formatting Rule dialog box, select Use a formula to determine which cells to format.
- In the Format values where this formula is true box, enter the above-mentioned formula for weekends or weekdays.
- Click the Format button and select the desired format.
- Click OK twice to save the changes and close the dialog windows.
For the detailed information on each step, please see How to set up conditional formatting with formula.
The result looks pretty nice, doesn't it?
How to count weekdays and weekends in Excel
To get the number of weekdays or weekends in the list of dates, you can use the WEEKDAY function in combination with SUM. For example:
To count weekends, the formula in D3 is:
=SUM(--(WEEKDAY(A3:A20, 2)>5))
To count weekdays, the formula in D4 takes this form:
=SUM(--(WEEKDAY(A3:A20, 2)<6))
In Excel 365 and Excel 2021 that handle arrays natively, this works as a regular formula as shown in the screenshot below. In Excel 2019 and earlier, press Ctrl + Shift + Enter to make it an array formula.
How these formulas work:
The WEEKDAY function with return_type set to 2 returns a day number from 1 (Mon) to 7 (Sun) for each date in the range A3:A20. The logical expression checks if the returned numbers are greater than 5 (for weekends) or less than 6 (for weekdays). The result of this operation is an array of TRUE and FALSE values.
The double negation (--) coerces the logical values to 1's and 0's. And the SUM function adds them up. Given that 1 (TRUE) represents the days to be counted and 0 (FALSE) the days to be ignored, you get the desired result.
Tip. To calculate weekdays between two dates, use the NETWORKDAYS or NETWORKDAYS.INTL function.
If weekday then, if Saturday or Sunday then
Finally, let's discuss a bit more specific case that shows how to determine the day of the week, and if it's Saturday or Sunday then do something, if a weekday then do something else.
Suppose you are calculating payments for employees who have done some extra work on their days off, so you need to apply different payments rates for workdays and weekends. This can be done using the following IF statement:
- In the logical_test argument, nest the WEEKDAY function that checks whether a given day is a workday or weekend.
- In the value_if_true argument, multiply the number of working hours by the weekend rate (G4).
- In the value_if_false argument, multiply the number of working hours by the workday rate (G3).
The complete formula in D3 takes this form:
=IF(WEEKDAY(B3, 2)>5, C3*$G$4, C3*$G$3)
For the formula to copy correctly to the below cells, be sure to lock the rate cell addresses with the $ sign (like $G$4).
WEEKDAY function not working
Generally, there are two common errors that a WEEKDAY formula may return:
#VALUE! error occurs if either:
- Serial_number or return_type is non-numeric.
- Serial_number is out of supported dates range (1900 to 9999).
#NUM! error occurs when return_type is out of the permitted range (1-3 or 11-17).
This is how to use the WEEKDAY function in Excel to manipulate days of week. In the next article, we will explore Excel functions to operate on bigger time units such as weeks, months and years. Please stay tuned and thank you for reading!
Practice workbook for download
WEEKDAY formula in Excel - examples (.xlsx file)
284 comments
Hi,
j juts need automatic date count, example if i type 1 in other cell have to show 1 days, if i type 2 it has to count 2 days,
can you help me out please
Hi,
I have something to ask about the dates, because i want to make an automatic Present and Holiday for the days of Monday to Thursdays = Present and for Friday is = Holiday please help me
Hi,
If I have a number let's say 11, how can I get number of weeks like 2 week, 2 days
instead of 2.2
Please help
For my previous question, I got this syntax: =F2-DATE(YEAR(F2);1;0; however, it only extracts all the date numbers in a year. i.e. 1,2,3,...364,365,1,2,3,...365,366,1,2,3,.... what I wanted was for a sytax that would extract the list for each days of a year recurring every month.
Thanks for your support
Hello,
Thanks for the informative article. I was intereted to know how to get the list of dates of a year in each month but only till the end of each month. Eg. 1,2,3...29,30,1,2,3,...27,28,1,2,3,...29,30,31,1,2,3...
Thanks
Hi,
I stuck with a formula here. I have A2 (Work Start Date) B2 (Traget Completion Date) and B3 (Actual completion Date)and delays in B4. I want to retun the following logical formula. Can you please help.
So,B4 = If B3 is blank return TODAY - B2.
Thank you.
Regards
SPD
Hi,
I would like to ask how can I calculate the number of days in this scenario
Item Qty Date In (start) Date Out No. of Days No. of Stocks
A 1 2-2-2017 1
B 1 2-2-2017 2-14-2017 0
How can i make a conditions that will show if there is no date out they will count the days base on the date today.
Hope you can help me.
Thank you.
nina
Hi
Making a capacity grid based on two things weekdays and the day.
For instance at the top I have Week 1 with a drop down going to Week 13 Right underneath i want to have the corresponding dates according to the week and month. Example. February week 2- 2/13-2/17. I want to be able to change the week and the dates change with it automatically. I didn't put the month in but I guess that's important huh???
Any advice would be great
Hello, I would like to highlight a cell as a marker for today and put word "Today" as an indicator for today in highlighted cell A1. When today is over, I would like that the word "Today" that already was in cell A1 moves to cell A2 with the same highlight, and it does not show in cell A1 because it belonged to yesterday's indicator.
What is the formula? Thanks
Is there a a formula that if i put a date it will give me what the date will be in 12 weeks time for example
I have this chart in my report, is it possible that if i put data daily in count daily colum and it automatically add in the the weekly and monthly colum and that weekly coloum become zero on every sunday.
Looking forward for your kind response.
Count-Daily Count-Weekly Count-Monthly
TRA/JHA 10 10 95
RADARS 26 26 384
RADARS-Closed 26 26 384
ICR Entries MGR 1 1 33
SOP/JHA Reviewed 10 10 95
BMS INSPECTION 4 4 47
PRE-TASK(TBT) 30 30 421
hi,
I need to make a table for the office lottery which needs to be paid every Wednesday for the year. I need a table that has employee names in the first column and the Wednesday dates for each month across the first row. How do I do this?
Hi Dee,
Try this formula =DATE(year,month,1+7*NthDay)-WEEKDAY(DATE(year,month,8-DayofWeek),2)
See this article for an example http://crispexcel.com/weekday-workday-how-where-to-use-these-excel-date-functions/
please help with formula. i want to count based on several criteria so i use countifs. the dates are entered as 1/2/17, 2/3/17, etc.
what is the formula to count the date if it falls on a Monday, or a Tuesday? this is what i have tried, which does not work:
if(weekday(A:A,1),2)
I'm trying to make a calendar to give my police officer son in law for Christmas. I've not given up but so far drawing blanks.
He works 3 days on and 3 days off. I could just mark the days he works on a calendar. The problem is sometimes they make adjustments to the days he works, not often but it does happen.
I need to be able to mark (for example) the last three days he worked. Then have it highlight his future work days based on that. Iow, high lite 3 days, skip 3 days but be able to modify the days and it auto adjust.
My brain feels like scrambled eggs :-( any ideas?
I need a formula to calculates the weekend dates only
HI,
I need a formula, where I put today's date in one cell, ie, 25/11/2016 and get exact date of after 15 months ie, 24/02.2018? Please help.
Thanks.
I need a formula, where I put one week in one cell, ie, January 2-6, 2017 and I have 5 other cells for Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, is there a forumla that I can input and it will automatically put 01/2/17, 01/03/17, etc.? Please help. Thanks.
If I have the number of days it takes for x amount of money to run out, how can I get the exact day to be calculated in a formula?
Thank you in advance.
hi guys, I have a question. I have a particular start date and a list of other dates.
I am required to extract 8 WEEKNUMS starting from my start date followed by the list of dates given. Again, i'm only required to extract 8 weeknum,
how to i do it?
help on this is much appreciated. Thanks all :)
How to list out every Thursday in between two dates? thank you in advance.