How to Convert Values to Numbers with N in Excel

N turns TRUE into 1, FALSE and text into 0, and leaves numbers alone — the safe way to do maths on mixed cells.

You will learn to

• Convert a TRUE/FALSE tick into 1 or 0
• Score points from a tick box
• Add a column that sometimes contains text without #VALUE!

How it works

N(value) converts a value to a number: numbers and dates stay the same, TRUE becomes 1, FALSE becomes 0, and text becomes 0. It is a quick, readable way to score tick boxes — =N(B3)*C3 earns the points only when the box is TRUE.

N is also a shield against #VALUE!. If a column sometimes holds notes like "TBC", =C5+D5 errors, but =C5+N(D5) treats the note as 0 and keeps calculating. Note that N works on single values; for whole ranges use SUM, which already ignores text.

=C5+N(D5)