DATE, YEAR, MONTH, and DAY

Read this DATE, YEAR, MONTH, and DAY example

Start with the business need: Build a valid reporting date from separate year, month, and day fields. Read each argument, reference, field, or control in the example before copying it into a larger model.

=DATE(A2,B2,C2)

DATE, YEAR, MONTH, and DAY: what Excel is actually doing

DATE constructs a valid Excel date from year, month, and day numbers. YEAR, MONTH, and DAY extract components from a real date serial, not from arbitrary text.

Your desk challenge for lesson 61

Construct a date from separate fields, then prove it is numeric and extract each component.

• Confirm that source values are real Excel dates.
• Choose calendar-day or working-day logic deliberately.
• Test month-end, leap-year, and blank-date scenarios.

The DATE, YEAR, MONTH, and DAY mistake to catch

Dates stored as text may look correct but fail sorting, arithmetic, and grouping.

Evidence that your DATE, YEAR, MONTH, and DAY result is trustworthy

Display source dates with an unambiguous format and check serial values when imported dates behave unexpectedly.

• Explain how the result supports this task: Build a valid reporting date from separate year, month, and day fields.
• Retain one known-result check and one boundary or exception check.
• Record the source, period, unit, and refresh assumption beside the output.