How to change decimal places in Excel

You can watch a video tutorial here.

Excel is frequently used for calculations and has many functions to help with basic mathematical operations.  When performing calculations, the resulting number may have decimal places that are not displayed or too many decimal values are displayed. In Excel there are 2 ways in which the decimal places can be changed.

Option 1 – Use the toolbar buttons 

Step 1 – Select the data 

• Select the cells for which the decimal places are to be changed

Step 2 – Increase the decimal places

• Go to Home > Number
• Click the Increase Decimal button to increase the number of decimal places
• Each click will increase the decimal places by one number so to add 2 decimal places you need to click twice

Step 3 – Decrease the decimal places

• Go to Home > Number
• Click the Decrease Decimal button to decrease the number of decimal places
• Each click will decrease the decimal places by one number 

Option 2 – Format the cells to display decimal places when typing

Step 1 – Select the range

• Select the range where you want decimal places to be changed 

Step 2 – Open the Format Cells window

• Right-click and select Format Cells  from the context menu

OR

Go to Home > Number  and click on the arrow to expand the menu

OR

Go to Home > Cells > Format > Format Cells

OR

Press Ctrl+1

Step 3 – Define the format

• On the Number tab, select the Number category
• Specify ‘2’ as the number of decimal places
• Click OK

Step 4 – Check the result

• The number of decimal places changes from 1 to 2