How to Calculate Business Days in Excel

Excel has two built-in functions for business day calculations: NETWORKDAYS for counting business days between two dates, and WORKDAY for finding a date that is a given number of business days from a starting point. Both functions handle weekends automatically and accept an optional list of holidays.

Counting Business Days Between Two Dates: NETWORKDAYS

The NETWORKDAYS function returns the number of working days between a start date and an end date, inclusive of both endpoints.

=NETWORKDAYS(start_date, end_date, [holidays])

Example: To count business days between April 1, 2026 and April 30, 2026, with holidays in the range E2:E10:

=NETWORKDAYS(A2, B2, $E$2:$E$10)

If A2 contains April 1 and B2 contains April 30, and no holidays fall in that range, the result is 22. If one holiday falls on a weekday in that period, the result is 21.

The holidays argument is optional. If you omit it, the function counts all weekdays without subtracting any holidays.

Finding a Due Date: WORKDAY

The WORKDAY function takes a start date and a number of business days, and returns the date that falls that many business days later. This is the right tool for calculating invoice due dates, project deadlines, and delivery windows.

=WORKDAY(start_date, days, [holidays])

Example: To find the date 30 business days after the date in A2, excluding holidays in E2:E10:

=WORKDAY(A2, 30, $E$2:$E$10)

If A2 is April 1, 2026, and no holidays are in the range, the result is May 12, 2026, which is 30 business days later. The formula skips all Saturdays and Sundays automatically.

Setting Up a Holiday List

Create a named range or a column of dates representing the holidays you want to exclude. For US federal holidays, you would list dates like January 1, January 19, February 16, and so on for the year. Format the column as dates, not text, or the functions will not recognize them.

To make the holiday range reusable across many formulas, select the range, go to Formulas, then Define Name, and give it a name like Holidays2026. You can then write:

=NETWORKDAYS(A2, B2, Holidays2026)

Custom Weekends: NETWORKDAYS.INTL and WORKDAY.INTL

If your business operates on a non-standard schedule, use the .INTL variants. These accept a weekend parameter as either a number (1 through 17, each representing a different weekend pattern) or a 7-character string where each character represents a day from Monday to Sunday, with 1 meaning non-working and 0 meaning working.

For a Friday-Saturday weekend: "0000110"

=NETWORKDAYS.INTL(A2, B2, "0000110", Holidays2026)

Formatting the Result

WORKDAY returns a date serial number. If the cell displays a number like 46548 instead of a date, format the cell as a date: right-click, Format Cells, Date, and choose your preferred format. NETWORKDAYS returns a count of days, which needs no special formatting.

When a Formula Is Overkill

For one-off due date lookups or quick business day counts, a dedicated calculator is faster than building an Excel formula from scratch. The Business Day Calculator handles holidays automatically without requiring you to maintain a holiday list. For recurring bulk calculations across many rows of data, Excel formulas are the right tool.

FAQ

What is the difference between NETWORKDAYS and NETWORKDAYS.INTL?

NETWORKDAYS always treats Saturday and Sunday as the weekend. NETWORKDAYS.INTL lets you specify a custom weekend, such as Friday and Saturday for Middle Eastern business calendars, using a weekend number or a string like "0000011" to mark which days are non-working.

Does NETWORKDAYS include the start date and end date?

Yes. NETWORKDAYS counts both the start date and end date as working days if they fall on weekdays. If you want to exclude the start date, add 1 to it in the formula: =NETWORKDAYS(A1+1, B1).

What if my holiday list includes weekends?

NETWORKDAYS and WORKDAY ignore holidays that fall on weekends automatically. You can include them in your holiday range without affecting the result.