How to swap cell values based on a condition In Excel?

Question

A	B	C
start_time	end_time	duration
01-09-2021 6:45:38 PM	01-09-2021 6:45:24 PM	#####
01-09-2021 6:42:09 PM	01-09-2021 6:41:40 PM	#####
28-09-2021 1:53:18 AM	28-09-2021 2:00:02 AM	00:06:44

Duration is calculated by subtraction (BA).But In some cells I have A>B.Then the duration cant be calculated. I want to interchange the cell values where A>B. In roughly,If A>B then,A=B and B=A.otherwise The cell will be remain unchanged. How Can I do it in excel?

Answer 1

Simply try below formula then apply desired date/time format to resulting cell.

=IF(A2>B2,A2-B2,B2-A2)

Answer 2

The simplest solution would be using ABS , like so:

=ABS(A2-B2)

So, regardless of the order, the duration will be positive.

The only thing left to do is format eg 0.99984 to a Time format. If you end up with a duration greater than 1, that means 24 hours (1 day).

So, you could also get the number of days and the hours by:

=ROUNDDOWN(C2;0) -- To get whole days

=MOD(C2;ROUNDDOWN(C2;0)) -- To get the time (Hours, Minutes, Seconds)

Hope this was helpful! ^_^