Lower() in excel

The lower() function in excel converts the string of characters into the lowercase. If the string of characters is already in lowercase, there will be no conversion. If the string of characters is in uppercase (capital), it will be converted to lowercase.

The LOWER function can be used as a formula to organize such words when a large volume of text is present in excel. It is given by:

LOWER(text)

In excel, we declare the function as:

Where,

C2 is the specified cell that contains the string in the form of text

Or

We can declare the function with the text enclosed within the double quotes, as shown below:

It will produce the output as text.

The LOWER() function converts the uppercase letters in the specified cell into lowercase letters, as shown below:

There are multiple cases where LOWER() function works in different ways.

Case 1: When the first letter of a word is in uppercase

It will convert the first letter of the specified word in lowercase, as shown below:

Case 2: When there are multiple uppercase letters in a word

It will convert all the uppercase letters present in a cell in lowercase, as shown below:

Case 3: When there is more than one word in a cell

It will convert all the uppercase letters present in a sentence into lowercase, as shown below:

Thus, whatever may be the format of lowercase and uppercase letters, the desired result will be the letters in the lowercase only.

Case 4: If all the letters are already in lowercase

In such a case, there will be no affect on the specified statement in a cell. The lowercase letters in words will remain the same.

Effect of LOWER() function

• All numbers present in the cell are not affected.
• The punctuation marks are not affected.
• The spacing between two words is not affected.
• It only applies to the characters. The conversion is only performed on the uppercase letters.
• The lowercase letters are not affected. It will remain the same.

Note: UPPER() and LOWER() are different functions. We should not get confused between the two. The UPPER() converts the lowercase into uppercase, while the LOWER() converts the uppercase into the lowercase.

Let's consider some examples based on the LOWER() formula.

Examples

Example 1: To convert the name of students from uppercase to lowercase

Consider the below steps:

1. Click on the first cell of the lower() column, as shown below:
   
2. Type '=LOWER(B4).'
   
   The selected cell is shown enclosed in the blue boundary.
3. Press Enter. The uppercase letters in the specified cell will be converted to lowercase.
4. Click on the bottom-right corner of that cell and drag to the last cell present in the column, as shown below:
   
   The LOWER() will be automatically applied on the other cells of the specified column.
   

Based on the above data, the LOWER() function will work as:

PROPER(B4)
It is will return 'annie'
PROPER(B5)
It will return 'dimple'
PROPER(B6)
It will return 'farhan'
PROPER(B7)
It will return 'ginnie'
PROPER(B8)
It will return 'himanshi'

We can also specify text enclosed in double quotes instead of the cell number. Consider the below example.

PROPER("ANNIE")
It will return 'anie'
PROPER("DIMPLE")
It will return 'dimple'
PROPER("FARHAN")
It will return 'farhan'
PROPER("GINNIE")
It will return 'ginnie'
PROPER("HIMANSHI")
It will return 'himanshi'

Example 2: To convert a name of vegetable into lowercase letters.

The given vegetable name is CARROT.

Consider the below steps:

1. Click on any cell on the excel sheet.
2. Type '=LOWER("CARROT"), as shown below:
   
3. Press
4. The desired result after the conversion from uppercase to lowercase will appear, as shown below:
   

Note: The above method is useful in converting data in a single cell from uppercase to lowercase. But, in the case of large volume of data, we usually prefer to declare the specified cell number (such as B4, C4) inside the lower() function.

Example 3: To convert the given sentences from the combination of lowercase and uppercase letters into only lowercase.

Consider the below steps:

1. Click on the first cell of the lower() column.
2. Type '=LOWER(B3),' as shown below:
   
3. Press Enter. The uppercase letters in the specified cell will be converted to lowercase.
   Click on the bottom-right corner of that cell and drag to the last cell present in the column. The lower() will be automatically applied on the other cells of the specified column, as shown below: