UPPER, LOWER and PROPER functions in Excel

UPPER changes text to capital letters, LOWER to small letters, and PROPER capitalises the first letter of each word.

Names typed in a hurry arrive in every style: ALL CAPITALS, all small letters, and mixtures of both. These three functions put a column of text into one consistent case. Excel has no Change Case button of the kind Word has, so formulas are the way to do it.

Syntax

=UPPER(text)

=LOWER(text)

=PROPER(text)

Argument	What it is
`text`	The text to change, or a cell that holds it.

Examples

Each result below is what Excel itself showed for the formula on the sample sheet.

Sample sheet: Text as people really type it: stray spaces, mixed capitals, codes with dashes.

	A	B	C	D
1	Full name	Email	Code	Amount as text
2	asha verma	asha.verma@example.com	PB-10-1234	1,250
3	RAVI KUMAR	ravi@example.org	DL-08-0042	300
4	meena gill	meena.gill@example.com	MH-12-9876	45.50
5	Kabir Khan	kabir@example.net	RJ-14-0007	12 kg

=UPPER(A4)
Result: MEENA GILL
"meena gill" in capitals.
=LOWER(A3)
Result: ravi kumar
"RAVI KUMAR" in small letters.
=PROPER(A3)
Result: Ravi Kumar
The first letter of each word in capitals and the rest small.
=PROPER(TRIM(A2))
Result: Asha Verma
With TRIM, a badly typed name becomes a clean one.
=LOWER(B2)
Result: asha.verma@example.com
Email addresses are usually stored in small letters.
=UPPER(LEFT(A4,1))&LOWER(MID(A4,2,100))
Result: Meena gill
Sentence case: only the very first letter in capitals.
=PROPER("o'brien and sons pvt ltd")
Result: O'Brien And Sons Pvt Ltd
PROPER capitalises after every character that is not a letter, including an apostrophe.
=EXACT(A3,UPPER(A3))
Result: TRUE
EXACT compares with attention to case. TRUE means the text is entirely in capitals.

What each one does

Function	"rAVI kumar" becomes
UPPER	RAVI KUMAR
LOWER	ravi kumar
PROPER	Ravi Kumar

Digits, punctuation and spaces are left as they are. Extra spaces are not removed, so combine with TRIM when cleaning names.

Replacing the original text

Like all formulas, these return their result in another cell. To change the data itself, write the formula in a spare column, copy the results, and use Paste Special, Values over the original column. Then delete the helper column.

Flash Fill is a quick alternative for a one-time job. Type the first name correctly in the next column, press Ctrl and E, and Excel copies the pattern down.

What PROPER gets wrong

PROPER follows a simple rule: a capital after every character that is not a letter, and small letters everywhere else. That rule fails in predictable places.

After an apostrophe: "o'brien" becomes "O'Brien", which is right, but "ravi's" becomes "Ravi'S", which is not.
Initials and abbreviations: "PVT LTD" becomes "Pvt Ltd", "USA" becomes "Usa", "IIT Delhi" becomes "Iit Delhi".
Names with inner capitals: "McDonald" becomes "Mcdonald", "DeSouza" becomes "Desouza".
Small words in titles: "of" and "and" get capitals too.

After using PROPER on a list of names or companies, read through the results. A few SUBSTITUTE calls can repair the regular offenders, such as SUBSTITUTE(PROPER(A2),"'S","'s").

Sentence case

There is no function for "capital at the start of the sentence only". Build it from parts, as the sixth example does: the first character in capitals, joined to the rest in small letters.

Case in comparisons

Excel's ordinary comparisons, and lookups such as VLOOKUP and MATCH, ignore case. "DELHI", "Delhi" and "delhi" all count as equal, so you rarely need to change case just to make a lookup work.

When case does matter, as with passwords or codes where "ab12" and "AB12" differ, use EXACT, which is TRUE only when two texts match letter for letter. To test whether a cell is all capitals, compare it with its own UPPER version, as in the last example.

Where each is useful

UPPER: codes such as PAN, vehicle numbers, IFSC codes and state abbreviations.
LOWER: email addresses and website addresses.
PROPER: names of people and places, as a first pass.

Common mistakes

Expecting the original cell to change.
Trusting PROPER with company names and abbreviations.
Forgetting to trim, so that names still fail to match because of spaces.

In Google Sheets

UPPER, LOWER and PROPER are the same in Google Sheets.

Related functions

Every result on this page was calculated in Microsoft Excel (version 16.0, build 20326) on 12 November 2026, not typed by hand.

This is an independent help site. It is not connected with or approved by Microsoft. Excel and Microsoft 365 are trademarks of Microsoft Corporation, named here only to say which program a formula is for. The people and figures in the sample sheets are made up.