How to check if first character in a cell is a letter or number in Excel?

This article is talking about checking if the first character in a cell is a letter or number in Excel. Please do as follows.

Check if first character in a cell is a letter or number with formula

Check if first character in a cell is a letter or number with formula

You can apply the following formulas to check if the first character in a cell is a letter or number in Excel.

1. Select a blank cell for placing the checking result, then enter formula into the Formula Bar, and then press the Enter key. See screenshot:

=IF(ISERR(LEFT(A2,1)*1),"letter","number")

Note: In the formula, A2 is the cell contains the value you need to check.

2. Keep selecting the result cell, drag the Fill Handle down until all corresponding cells are checked.

You will get a result which displayed as letter if the cell value begins with letter. Otherwise, you will get the result displayed as number as below screenshot shown.

Note: If the first character of specified cell is a special character, please apply the following formula to get the results. 

=IF(A2="","",IF(AND(CODE(LEFT(A2,1))>=48,CODE(LEFT(A2,1))<=57),"Number",IF(OR(AND(CODE(LEFT(A2,1))>=65,CODE(LEFT(A2,1))<=90),AND(CODE(LEFT(A2,1))>=97,CODE(LEFT(A2,1))<=122)),"Letter","Other")))

Related articles:

• How to check if a certain range name exists in Excel?
• How to check if a cell value is between two values in Excel?
• How to check if cell begins or ends with a specific character in Excel?

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