How to Make Excel 2010 formulas permanent

This tutorial will let you know how to make the result of an Excel formula a permanent value

Once you have used an Excel formula to work something out it can be useful to keep this value by making it permanent. This tutorial shows you how to make excel formulas permanent.

Step # 1 -- Using SUM to Create a Value

Start Excel and load a sheet with some information. Here we are going to use SUM to add the figures in the "2011" column. In cell "B6" type "=sum(B2:B5)" and press return. The result of the sum will appear in the cell. If you change one of the values in any of the selected cells the formula will change the result automatically, this is what we want to stop.

Step # 2 -- Making the Value Permanent

To learn how to make excel formulas permanent you need to remove the formula but keep the value. Click on the cell and click "Copy" in the top left of the window. Now right click on the same cell, "B6" here, and in the menu that appears locate the "Paste Values" icon below the "Paste Options" title. This will only paste the value and leave behind the formula.

Step # 3 -- Checking the Permanence of the Value

Now when we change the values in the cells above the formula the value that the formula calculated will not change. This means the formula has been given a permanent value.

[person]

Reported for using a misleading title. I was expecting a video that teaches viewers how to prevent formulas from turning into text upon Excel restart (something your title implied) instead we got a video about turning the formula's result into text (what I'm trying to avoid SMH).

[MacInvestments]

Very different than what I was expecting. I have an issue using Excel where I am using the =LEFT formula but excel identities it as text rather than a number so when running my looking up they cells return #N/A need the formulas but would like excel to recognize the data as Number.

[bm]

I'm having the opposite problem.. I have a large spreadsheet that utilizes a lot of formulas, but Excel keeps changing them to values only when I save and reopen it. I need them to be formulas because the input data changes daily. Fixing each cell every time I open the document is quite frustrating and tedious to say the least. If anyone could provide help with this I would very much appreciate it.

[daniel-fd]

Thank you so much... this helps a lot when sorting...

[cat]

lol this is the opposite of what I was looking for.

[kele]

This is useless... Is there a way to make result permanent? I want 1st value which appear in the cell to stay. It is easy just to delete formula and type value manually, I need this to work automatically...

[ube-s]

But why.  why do you want a wrong answer?

[nicolascollen]

Might aswell delete the formula and type out the result. Pointless tbh.

[philwte]

Although I don't feel "reporting" is needed... This video is a waste of time, copy and paste values is obvious... People here are looking for something more indepth than that.

[koroespinacas]

rubbish. This doesn't make the formula permanent, it makes the last value the formula outputted the value of the cell that previously contained the formula