Help Centre › Functions & Formulas
For a full list of available calculation functions, please read What calculation functions are supported.
This article describes the formula syntax and usage of the MID function.
Description
MID returns a specific number of characters from a text string, starting at the position you specify, based on the number of characters you specify.
Syntax
MID(text, start_num, num_chars)
The function syntax has the following arguments:
- text - Required. The text string containing the characters you want to extract.
- start_num - Required. The position of the first character you want to extract in text. The first character in text has start_num 1, and so on.
- If start_num is greater than the length of text, MID returns "" (empty text).
- If start_num is less than the length of text, but start_num plus num_chars exceeds the length of text, MID returns the characters up to the end of text.
- If start_num is less than 1, MID returns the #VALUE! error value.
- num_chars - Required for MID. Specifies the number of characters you want MID to return from text.
- If num_chars is negative, MID returns the #VALUE! error value.
Example
| Formula | Description | Result |
| =MID(Fluid Flow, 1, 5) | Returns 5 characters from the string in A2, starting at the 1st character. | Fluid |
| =MID(Fluid Flow, 7, 20) | Returns 20 characters from the string in A2, starting at the 7th character. Because the number of characters to return (20) is greater than the length of the string (10), all characters, beginning with the 7th, are returned. No empty characters (spaces) are added to the end. | Flow |
| =MID(Fluid Flow, 20, 5) | Because the starting point is greater than the length (10) of the string, empty text is returned. |
Errors
For a full list of formula errors, please read Formula errors.