Contents

# EDATE

The result is a date which is a number of months away from the start date. Only months are considered; days are not used for calculation.

This function is part of the Open Document Format for Office Applications (OpenDocument) standard Version 1.2. (ISO/IEC 26300:2-2015)

### Syntax

EDATE(StartDate; Months)

StartDate is a date.

Months is the number of months before (negative) or after (positive) the start date.

When entering dates as part of formulas, slashes or dashes used as date separators are interpreted as arithmetic operators. Therefore, dates entered in this format are not recognized as dates and result in erroneous calculations. To keep dates from being interpreted as parts of formulas use the DATE function, for example, DATE(1954;7;20), or place the date in quotation marks and use the ISO 8601 notation, for example, "1954-07-20". Avoid using locale dependent date formats such as "07/20/54", the calculation may produce errors if the document is loaded under different locale settings.

Unambiguous conversion is possible for ISO 8601 dates and times in their extended formats with separators. If a #VALUE! error occurs, then unselect Generate #VALUE! error in LibreOfficeDev - Preferences Tools - Options - LibreOfficeDev Calc - Formula, button Details... in section "Detailed Calculation Settings", Conversion from text to number list box.

### Examples

What date is one month prior to 2001-03-31?

=EDATE("2001-03-31";-1) returns the serial number 36950. Formatted as a date, this is 2001-02-28.

Related Topics

EDATE wiki page.

Date & Time Functions

DATE

DATEDIF

DATEVALUE

DAY

DAYS

DAYS360

DAYSINMONTH

DAYSINYEAR

EASTERSUNDAY

EDATE

EOMONTH

HOUR

ISLEAPYEAR

ISOWEEKNUM

MINUTE

MONTH

MONTHS

NETWORKDAYS

NETWORKDAYS.INTL

NOW

SECOND

TIME

TIMEVALUE

TODAY

WEEKDAY

WEEKNUM

WEEKNUM_EXCEL2003

WEEKNUM_OOO

WEEKS

WEEKSINYEAR

WORKDAY

WORKDAY.INTL

YEAR

YEARFRAC

YEARS