Excel Date Calculation

Mike:

Assuming you used DateDif(), the 14months was just because you used the wrong conversion codes on the 2 portions

Here is the MS support page for DateDif()

https://support.office.com/en-us/article/DATEDIF-function-25dba1a4-2812-480b-84dd-8b32a451b35c

It does mention that the function converts day counts.

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I took a roundabout way to get to HansV's formula, in tweaked form.

First, rather than deal with row/column ids, I named each of the date cells:

Start1, Endd1, Start2, Endd2 

I find named ranges and named cells easier to work with in formulas

(note cannot use End1, because entering end in the name field takes you to the horizontal end of the worksheet, oops, new trick to me)

In my first round, I calculated the days in the 2 separate ranges, summed them, then converted the total days into YMD

Next I tried HansV's formula and got the same result. But I just couldn't get my head around his formulation of the Date dif using:  "0,a4-a3+a2-a1". 

It just didn't make sense to me, "0" as a start date.  Eventually I figured out that in the background the datedif function was calculating days, then using the last parameter to calculate the display, so by calculating the number of days as "end date" for datedif would work.  Personally I still have head space problems so I tweaked it a little: "0,(a4-a3)+(a2-a1)"

I got the same result.

So my formula ended up as

=DATEDIF(0,(endd2-Start2)+(endd1-Start1),"Y")&" year(s) "&DATEDIF(0,(endd2-Start2)+(endd1-Start1),"ym")&" month(s) "&DATEDIF(0,(endd2-Start2)+(endd1-Start1),"md")&" DAY(s)"

Personally, I find using the brackets around the 2 date ranges easier to relate to, ie:

(endd2-Start2)+(endd1-Start1)

Here are my formulas

Note the cell name displayed

Here is my example spreadsheet:

https://1drv.ms/x/s!Am8lVyUzjKfpnw5anhJU1VjmCovv

HansV

Just curious, where did you get the idea for using "0" as start date?

Let's say the dates are in A1 to A4.

One option:

=DATEDIF(0,A4-A3+A2-A1,"y")&" year(s) and "&DATEDIF(0,A4-A3+A2-A1,"ym")&" month(s)"