How to Calculate the Number of Business Days in a Specified Period in Excel

In this article, we will learn How to Calculate the Number of Business Days in a Specified Period in Excel.

What are business days and non business days ?

Usually Saturdays and Sundays are weekends meaning non business days. Sometimes calculating the total work days between two dates,  we can manually calculate the number of days between the days and subtract the number of days. This doesn't look easy and can lead to mistakes if the two given dates are too much apart. NETWORKDAYS function has the fixed type of weekend which is Saturday and Sunday. Let's understand the function, its syntax and an example to illustrate the usage.

NETWORKDAYS Function in Excel

To get the networking days between dates having holidays use NETWORKDAYS function in Excel. It takes Saturday and Sunday as default holidays.

NETWORKDAYS Function Syntax:

Start_date : count of first date

End_date : count of end date

Holidays : [optional] argument in the function

Note:

You can use the extended version of NETWORKDAYS function which is NETWORKDAYS.INTL function, this function lets you edit the weekends as per choice.

Example :

All of these might be confusing to understand. Let's understand how to use the function using an example. Here we have some sample dates where we need to find the total working days between the two given dates where Saturday and Sunday are non working days and considering national holidays as working days. Here we have start_date, end date and a couple of extra holidays.

Use the formula:

As you can see net working days are 20 in between dates having holidays.

NETWORKDAYS.INTL function in Excel

Here we have some sample dates where we need to find the total working days between the two given dates where Saturday and Sunday are non working days and considering national holidays as working days.

Use the formula:

As you see there are 28 working days between the dates taking Sat & Sun as default non working days.

Now we want to take the only Sunday as non working day in the week and considering national holidays as non working days. Here national holidays are called as holidays using named range.

Use the formula:

11 : argument for the Sunday as only non working days in a week

As you can see the formula returns 68 days. This formula is very useful for the government employees as per conditions explained.

Masking days

Now an example is explained using the masking days in week. Considering all working days in a week and all national holidays as working.

Use the formula:

1 means non workday and 0 means workday

As you can see, there are 50 working days between the two dates. Similarly you can find the working days between any two given dates. Below are some more examples.

In the D7 cell, Tuesday, Thursday, Saturday and Sunday are taken as non work days. But in the D8 cell you must be curious to know how the number of days can be negative. Yes you are right, days cannot be negative. The negative sign denotes that the end_date and start date are not in correct order whereas the magnitude 11 denotes the number of working days between the two dates.

Here are all the observational notes using the NETWORKDAYS function in Excel
Notes :

1. Excel stores dates as serial numbers and is used in calculation by the function. So it’s recommended to use dates as cell reference or using the DATE function instead of giving direct argument to the function. Check the validation of date values if the function returns #VALUE! Error.
2. If the start date is greater than the end date, the function returns the number of days with a negative sign.
3. If the start date and end date is the same date and that date is working, the function returns 1.
4.  If the start date or end date is out of range, then function returns #NUM! Error.
5. Holidays argument must be given as array reference, not the individual dates separated using commas, the function throws too many arguments error.

Hope this article about How to Calculate the Number of Business Days in a Specified Period in Excel is explanatory. Find more articles on calculating values and related Excel formulas here. If you liked our blogs, share it with your friends on Facebook. And also you can follow us on Twitter and Facebook. We would love to hear from you, do let us know how we can improve, complement or innovate our work and make it better for you. Write to us at info@exceltip.com.

Related Articles :

Count holidays between dates in Excel : count non working days between the two given dates using the DATEDIF and NETWORKDAYS function in Excel.

Extract days between dates ignoring years in Excel : count the days between the two dates using different functions and mathematical operation in Excel

Count Birth Dates By Month in Excel : count the number of dates lying in a particular month using the SUMPRODUCT and MONTH function in Excel.

SUM price by weekdays in Excel : sum price values corresponding to the number of dates in a particular weekday using the SUMPRODUCT and WEEKDAY function in Excel.

How to use the NETWORKDAYS function in Excel : Returns the working days between the two given dates using the NETWORKDAYS function.

How to use the WORKDAYS function in Excel : Returns a workday date value after days added to the start_date using the WORKDAYS function in Excel.

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