In Microsoft Office Excel, it is possible to combine multiple cells into one. But if you use the Merge and Center tool from the Align block for this operation, data is lost in all cells except those in the upper left cell of the range.
Instructions
Step 1
To concatenate cells in Excel without losing the data they contain, use the ampersand operator - the & character, which in English denotes the conjunction "and". Place the cursor in the cell where the data will be merged, in the formula bar, put an equal sign and an open parenthesis.
Step 2
Select the first cell with the left mouse button and enclose a space character in quotation marks - & " & between the ampersands, select the next cell and retype & " &. Continue until you have marked all the cells that need to be merged in this way. To finish entering the formula, place the closing parenthesis and press Enter. The formula will look something like this: = (A1 & " & B1 & " & C1).
Step 3
If you need to separate the combined data with punctuation marks, put them after the first ampersand and the quotation mark, after entering the punctuation mark, do not forget to add a space. Example formula for combined data using punctuation marks: = (A1 & ";" & B1 & ";" & C1).
Step 4
You can also use the "Link" function. To do this, place the cursor in a cell, click the fx icon in the formula bar. A new "Feature Wizard" dialog box will open. Select the CONCATENATE function from the list or search for it using the search field. In the "Function arguments" window, place the cursor in the "Text1" field and select the first cell of the merged range with the left mouse button. Move your cursor to the Text2 field and select the next cell in your document. Click on the OK button.
Step 5
When using this method, do not select the entire range of cells to be merged at once, this will lead to the fact that the data will be lost. The formula should not look like = CONCATENATE (A1: B1). Separate cell addresses with ";" - semicolon, then all values will be saved. Example formula: = CONCATENATE (A1; B1; C1).
