How to combine the first initial and last name into one cell in Excel?

If there are two columns in a worksheet, one lists first names, the another one contains last names, how can you combine the initial of the first name and last name into one cell as below screenshot shown? In this tutorial, I introduce some tricks on handling this problem in Excel.

Combine first initial and last name with formula

Combine first initial and last name with Kutools for Excel

Combine first initial and last name with formula

Here have two formulas can help you combine initial of first name and last name into one, choose one of them to use.

=CONCATENATE(LEFT(A1,1)," ", B1)

=LEFT(A1,1) & " " & B1

Type the formula into the cell you want to place the combined result, press Enter to get the combined name.

In the formula, it concatenate names with space, you can change " " to other delimiter as you need.

Combine first initial and last name with Kutools for Excel

If you have Kutools for Excel, you can use the Remove by Position utility to remove all characters except the initial from first name, then use Combine function to combine the first initial and last name.

After installing Kutools for Excel, please do as below:（Free Download Kutools for Excel Now!)

1. Select the first names you want to use, click Kutools > Text > Remove by Position. (You had better have a copy of the data first.)

2. In the Remove by Position dialog, type 999 into Numbers textbox, check Specify checkbox, type 2 into the next textbox.

3. Click Ok, the first names will be removed but left the first initials. Select the first initial cells and last names, click Kutools > Merge & Split > Combine Rows, Columns or Cells without Losing Data.

4. In the popping dialog, check Combine columns, then specify the options you need in next three sections.

5. Click Ok. Now the first initial and last names are combined into one cell.