How to convert a date to text format in excel file using python

Question

Excel store date Column call Today and data type is date

Today
13/12/2021
14/12/2021
15/12/2021

when i import the excel to another excel using python, how to change the date type to text type?

below is my code and try to convert, but not work. could anyone give me advise? thanks

data.insert(0, {'Date':datetime.strptime(str(Today),'%d/%m/%Y').strftime('%d/%m/%Y')})

Answer 1

Excel try to recognize date format even if you cast your column Today as string.

Suppose the following dataframe:

df = pd.DataFrame({'ID': [123, 456, 789], 'Name': ['Louis', 'Paul', 'Alexandre'],
                   'Today': pd.date_range('2021-12-14', periods=3, freq='D')})
print(df)

# Output:
    ID       Name      Today
0  123      Louis 2021-12-14
1  456       Paul 2021-12-15
2  789  Alexandre 2021-12-16

If you export your dataframe with df.to_excel('data.xlsx', index=False) , you got:

Here, the trick:

with pd.ExcelWriter('data.xlsx') as writer:
    df.to_excel(writer, index=False)
    wb = writer.book
    ws = wb.active
    # For the third column only (Today, Col C)
    for col in ws.iter_cols(min_col=3, max_col=3):
        # For all rows below header (C2, C3, C4, ...)
        for cell in col[1:]:
            cell.number_format = 'DD/MM/YYYY'

Now, you got: