DAYS in SoftMaker PlanMaker: Calculate the Exact Days Between Dates

Use DAYS for shipment lead times, elapsed calendar days, date-difference audits and service periods when every day counts, including weekends. The difference is end minus start; reversing the dates changes the sign. SoftMaker specifies the order explicitly because an older PlanMaker function with a similar name uses the reverse argument order. Official PlanMaker DAYS reference.

DAYS does not count only working days: choose NETWORKDAYS for a Monday–Friday workday count with optional holidays. For complete elapsed months or years, see DATEDIF.

=DAYS(EndDate, StartDate)

Order matters: DAYS(EndDate,StartDate), not DAYS(StartDate,EndDate). There are two required arguments; the official syntax does not document any optional arguments or default values. The 2021, 2024 and 2026 English manuals give the same order. 2026 reference · 2024 reference · 2021 reference.

Use actual date-valued cells or construct dates with DATE(Year,Month,Day) to avoid locale-dependent interpretations. The examples use commas as in SoftMaker’s English syntax; if your installation uses semicolons for function arguments, substitute semicolons. The display of a date is controlled independently by cell number formats. There is no verified PlanMaker-specific result for invalid text or out-of-range serials in this guide.

Enter these values as spreadsheet dates using DATE, not as ambiguous date strings:

In C2, enter:

=DAYS(B2,A2)

Expected C2 result: 2. February 29 contributes one day and March 1 another in the elapsed-date calculation. Copy C2 to C3; the expected result is -2 because the interval is reversed. These two outputs were checked using independent date subtraction in Python’s Gregorian calendar, not observed in PlanMaker.

Why it works: Elapsed calendar days are a signed difference. A positive result means the first argument is later. If the dates are identical, the difference is zero.

These figures are expected Gregorian results, not native execution evidence. Avoid assuming that a displayed value such as 03/04/2024 means the same date in every regional format; DATE(2024,3,4) is unambiguous.

Suppose A2 holds a request date and B2 a completion date, entered with DATE. In C2, calculate elapsed calendar days using =DAYS(B2,A2). To flag a 14-calendar-day deadline in D2, enter:

=IF(DAYS(B2,A2)>14,"Over 14 calendar days","Within 14 calendar days")

For A2 = June 1, 2024 and B2 = June 17, 2024, the independently expected interval is 16 days, so the expected label is Over 14 calendar days. If the rule instead says 14 working days, change the calculation to NETWORKDAYS and make a conscious choice about including the starting/ending workday and holiday range; simply replacing the function in an existing SLA may change the meaning of the result.

SoftMaker documents a historical change: in PlanMaker 2016, DAYS switched to Excel’s EndDate,StartDate argument order. The earlier PlanMaker function was kept as DAYSP, which uses the opposite StartDate,EndDate order. The vendor states these are mathematically equivalent with reversed arguments:

=DAYS(DATE(2024,3,1),DATE(2024,2,28))
=DAYSP(DATE(2024,2,28),DATE(2024,3,1))

Each has an independently expected answer of 2. DAYSP is not an interchangeable spelling alias, because leaving arguments in the same positions changes the sign. Keep the reversed argument order when interpreting legacy formulas. DAYS official compatibility note · DAYSP official reference.

• Result is negative when you expected positive: confirm argument order. The first argument is the end date; swapping the two changes the sign. This is intentional, not an error.
• One-day discrepancy: do not count both endpoints as though DAYS were an inclusive attendance counter. DAYS is an elapsed difference, whereas NETWORKDAYS has different counting semantics.
• Unexpectedly large or nonsensical number: inspect whether one input is a numeric date serial versus text; format date cells consistently and use DATE to reconstruct ambiguous imports. Date display formats do not create valid dates by themselves.
• Formula rejected due to separators: check whether your regional installation expects ; rather than ,. Never replace commas inside quoted text without understanding the locale.
• Imported timestamps contain times: SoftMaker’s short DAYS reference does not specify fractional-day coercion. Do not assume an Excel-specific time-truncation rule is proven for PlanMaker; compare date-only cells and native-test timestamps before relying on this in a production calculation.
• Malformed dates / out-of-range serials: errors and boundary conventions were not native-tested; do not assume a specific PlanMaker error code based solely on Excel’s documentation.

PlanMaker 2021, 2024 and 2026 document DAYS(EndDate,StartDate). SoftMaker reports changing the order in PlanMaker 2016 for compatibility with Excel 2013 and later. Microsoft’s current Excel reference also specifies DAYS(end_date,start_date) and describes numeric serial and text coercion rules for Excel. The core datedifference and argument order therefore align in these documented versions, but Excel’s detailed coercion/error rules have not been verified natively in PlanMaker. SoftMaker 2026 · Microsoft Excel DAYS.

Edition/platform note: This is the English PlanMaker 2026 online reference, also compared to PlanMaker 2021/2024 manuals; the Windows/macOS/Linux product family was not installed or edition-tested for this guide. No claim of universal edition availability or Excel round-trip execution is made.

• SoftMaker PlanMaker 2026 — DAYS, accessed 2026-10-12; primary source for syntax, argument order, legacy compatibility and the official 2018 example.
• SoftMaker PlanMaker 2024 — DAYS, accessed 2026-10-12; confirmed earlier-version wording.
• SoftMaker PlanMaker 2021 — DAYS, accessed 2026-10-12; confirmed earlier-version wording.
• SoftMaker PlanMaker 2026 — DAYSP, accessed 2026-10-12; compatibility-function distinction.
• Microsoft Support — Excel DAYS, accessed 2026-10-12; separate Excel behaviour reference, not proof of PlanMaker runtime behaviour.

Validation status: Official documentation checked; calendar differences independently calculated. No native PlanMaker or Excel execution or genuine software screenshot. Formula results are labeled expected except when directly attributed to SoftMaker’s own documented examples.