Reformat

Standardize dates, phone numbers, or any other text to a consistent format directly in Microsoft Excel. For example, you can reformat product names before you include them in your catalog.

Run the bulk tool

Prerequisites

• You have installed GPT for Excel.
• You have opened a workbook containing text to reformat in a column.

1. Click GPT for Excel Word in the Home tab.

   

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   You can also go to Home > Add-ins > My add-ins > GPT for Excel Word.

2. In the sidebar, select Bulk tools, and click Reformat.

   

3. Set up your bulk tool run.

   

   	Field	Description	Example
   	Column name row (optional)	If your column names aren't in the first row, select the number of the row that contains the column names. The bulk tool will run on the rows below this one.	2
   	Reformat each cell in column	Select the column that contains the text to reformat.	A: Name
   	To	Describe the format to which you want to convert the text.	Color | Model | Size (S, M, or L)
   	Put results in column	Select the column to put the results in. Cells in this column won't be overwritten with the results if they contain text.	B: Standard format
   	Reformatting instructions (optional)	Enter specific instructions for the reformatting.	Use title case

4. Run the Reformat bulk tool starting from the first empty cell in the results column:

   1. Select a specific number of rows to run or select All rows.

   2. Click Run rows.

      
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      GPT for Work saves the setup in its bulk tool run history. You can reuse the setup by selecting it from History.

      

You have set up and run the Reformat bulk tool. If needed, try improving the results.

Improve results

Try different models

Find out which models work best for different use cases in our AI models overview. You can try different models by selecting them in the model switcher.

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The model selection is a spreadsheet setting. It applies to all bulk tool runs and all GPT function executions in the current spreadsheet.

tip

When using the sonar model for web search, enable Show sources to write the source references in the column to the right of the results column. This helps you understand the origin of the content and assess its reliability.

Set Creativity to 0

Ensure Creativity is set to 0. This setting helps the AI follow instructions more closely.

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Creativity is a spreadsheet setting. It applies to all bulk tool runs and all GPT function executions in the current document.

Provide reformatting instructions

You can improve reformatting quality by providing specific instructions that help the AI more closely follow your requirements for formatting rules and consistency.

You can define the following types of instructions for the AI:

• Reformatting instructions are defined for the current bulk tool run.
• Global instructions can also be defined in the spreadsheet settings and apply to all bulk tools and GPT functions in the current spreadsheet.

If both and global instructions are defined, the AI uses both as a combined set of instructions. For consistent results, make sure both sets of instructions are aligned and do not contradict each other.

For example, omit the global instructions and only define reformatting instructions:

What's next

Try another bulk tool.