How to change the encoding in Excel. Three ways

Often, when working with various files in the Excel program, a user may find that instead of intelligible letters there will be an incomprehensible font that cannot be read. The culprit is the wrong encoding. In this article, we will talk about how to change the encoding in Excel so that words can be read.

Method one: using Notepad ++

It so happened that changing the encoding of the text is easier in a third-party program than in Excel itself. That is why we will now consider a way how to change the encoding in Excel using Notepad ++.

So, to correctly complete all the steps, follow the instructions:

1. Launch the Notpad ++ program.
2. Click on the "File" button.
3. In the menu that appears, select "Open" (you can also do this by pressing CTRL + O).
4. In the explorer window that appears, pave the path to the desired file, the encoding of which is incorrect, and click the "Open" button.
5. In the file that opens, click the "Encodings" button, which is located above the toolbar.
6. In the menu, select the item "Convert to UTF-8", because the Excel encoding accepts this encoding with a bang.
7. Click the "Save" button, which is located on the left side of the toolbar, and close the program window.

That's all, now you know how to change the encoding in Excel in one of the ways. Although it is the fastest, most convenient and easiest, there are others that cannot be kept silent about.

Method Two: Using the Text Wizard

Directly in the Microsoft Excel program itself there are also tools that will allow you to change the encoding. This is exactly what will be discussed now, and more precisely, about the "Master of Texts":

1. Open the Excel program. Please note that you need to run it not by double-clicking on the file that is not displayed correctly, but directly the program with an empty sheet.
2. Go to the "Data" tab.
3. Click the "Receive External Data" button, and select "From Text" in the drop-down menu.
4. In the explorer window that appears, specify the path to the file that has encoding problems, and click the "Import" button.
5. Now the Text Wizard window itself opens. It is necessary to change the file format in it, which is why click on the drop-down list of the same name and select "Unicode (UTF-8)" from there.
6. Click "Next."
7. Skip the next window by clicking the "Next" button, all settings in it should be the default.
8. Now you need to determine the data format of the file column and, in accordance with it, select one of the items on the list of the same name. As a result, click "Finish."

After all this, you must specify the very first cell so that the data fits at the beginning of the table.

How to change the encoding in Excel in the second way is clear. We pass to the third.

Method Three: Saving

How to change encoding in Excel? To implement the third method, it is necessary to perform a number of the following actions:

1. Open the file in the program.
2. Click File.
3. Select "Save As."
4. In the menu that appears, select the extension and click "Tools", from the drop-down menu - "Web Document Settings".
5. In the window that appears, go to the "Encoding" tab and select it from the "Save Document As" list.
6. Click OK.

Now it remains only to indicate the folder where the file will be saved. The next time it is opened, the text should be displayed correctly.