How to Remove First 3 Characters in Excel (4 Suitable Methods)

Consider a situation where you have a dataset containing raw data, where the first 3 characters are unnecessary and need to be removed.

Method 1 – Using RIGHT Function

The combination of RIGHT function and LEN function can remove the first 3 characters from your cells.

Steps:

• In cell C4, apply the RIGHT function nested with the LEN function. The formula is:

The string_cell argument in the function (from where we will remove 3 characters) is B4.

LEN(B4)-3 is used as the num_chars, and will remove the first 3 characters from the cell.

• Press ENTER to return the result.

• Move your mouse cursor to the bottom right corner of your cell. When the cursor shows the cross sign, double-click on the Fill Handle to apply the same function to the rest of the cells.

Read More: How to Remove First Character in Excel

Method 2 – Using REPLACE Function

The REPLACE function replaces part of a text string with a different text string. Here, we will utilize this function to remove characters from cells by replacing text with nothing.

Steps:

• Enterthe following REPLACE function in cell C4:

B4 is the Old_text to be replaced.

Start_num is 1, as will start from the beginning of the text.

Num_chars is 3, as we want to replace the first three characters.

New_text is the modified text that will replace the old text, namely nothing (“”).

• Press ENTER to get the result.

• Use the Fill Handle as in Method 1 to copy the same formula to the other cells in the column.

Read More: How to Remove the Last 3 Characters in Excel

Method 3 – Using MID Function

The combination of the MID function and the LEN function performs the same operation as Method 1.

Steps:

• Enter the following formula in cell C4:

Here text is B4.

Start_num is 4, as we will remove the first 3 numbers.

Num_chars is defined as LEN(B4)-3)

• Press ENTER.
• Use the Fill Handle to apply the formula to all cells.

Method 4 – Using VBA to Create a User Defined Function

You can also define a custom function to do the job using VBA code.

Steps:

• Open the Microsoft Visual Basic for Applications Window by pressing Alt+F11.

• A new window is opened. In it, click Insert then select Module to open a new module.

• In the newly opened module, enter the following VBA code to make a UFD (user-defined function) to remove the first 3 characters from your cells:

Public Function RemoveFirst3(rng As String, cnt As Long)
RemoveFirst3 = Right(rng, Len(rng) - cnt)
End Function

• Save the code.
• Go back to the worksheet and in cell C4 start typing =RemoveFirst3 to check our UDF has been created successfully.

• Enter the following function in cell C4:

• Press ENTER to return the result.

• Use the Fill Handle to apply this function to the rest of the cells.

Read More: How to Remove the First Character from a String in Excel with VBA?

Things to Remember

Creating a custom formula has more limitations than regular VBA macros, as it cannot alter the structure or format of a worksheet or cell.

Applying the UFD, you can remove any number of characters from your cells.

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Related Articles

• How to Remove Last Character in Excel
• How to Remove Last Digit in Excel
• How to Remove Last Character from String Using VBA in Excel

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