LEN in SoftMaker PlanMaker: Count Text Characters

=LEN(Value)

The 2021, 2024 and 2026 official manuals all document one mandatory argument with this syntax. LEN returns the count of characters after applicable value-to-text conversion. Notably, for a date cell it counts the underlying date serial, not the number of characters in the cell’s displayed date format. The official manual’s example uses date 09/25/2014 stored as serial 41907; LEN(A1) consequently returns 5 rather than the length of the displayed date. The 2021 manual contains an unusual LEN(42,50) line in its examples; do not reuse that example as an argument-separator rule. The 2024/2026 references instead show LEN(42.50) → 4 in English decimal notation.

On a new, empty worksheet, type the following entries into the indicated cells. Treat codes as text, including their leading zeroes. These deliberately use only ordinary ASCII letters, hyphens and digits so that Unicode counting differences are outside the examples.

For row 1, enter the header words without the Markdown bold markers. Each item code is 11 characters: two letters, a hyphen, four digits, another hyphen, and three letters. Enter formulas in empty cells, such as E2 onward, so the example data is never overwritten.

1. Confirm that the codes in column A are text, including the hyphens and leading zeroes.
2. Enter =LEN(A2) in E2.
3. Expected E2: the number 11.
4. Fill down through E6. Each code in this sample should be 11 characters.

For practice with spaces: =LEN("Plan Maker") is expected 10 (four letters + one space + five letters). =LEN(" Red ") is expected 7 (two leading spaces + three letters + two trailing spaces). LEN does not automatically trim spaces.

The following are official documented simple cases, distinct from the invented worksheet dataset:

Date warning: a cell formatted to display a date may still contain a numeric serial. SoftMaker gives the 41907 example explicitly. Do not assume LEN(date_cell) tests whether a displayed date mask has the expected length.

=IF(AND(LEN(A2)=11,MID(A2,3,1)="-",MID(A2,8,1)="-"),"Shape ok","Review code")

Expected A2–A6: Shape ok for each sample row. For the different text CA2048RED, expect Review code because the length is 9. LEN checks only size, and the MID comparisons check only the two hyphens; the rule is not a full SKU validation. It does not check whether each character is a digit or whether the country and colour are acceptable.

For a simple warning-only formula use =IF(LEN(A2)=11,"11 chars","Different length"); expected A2: 11 chars. SoftMaker IF documents the branching operation.

• Spaces count: LEN includes leading/trailing/internal spaces. If a returned count looks too large, inspect imported text and don’t strip meaningful spaces without authorization.
• Date serials are not formatted dates: the official manual explicitly warns about date serial counting. Use a verified date-to-text formatting method if your real task is counting characters in a displayed date; that is a different problem.
• Numeric formatting isn’t preserved: the argument 42.50 is numeric 42.5, so its converted representation has four characters. If exact digit layout matters, store the original identifier as text.
• Blank-looking values: an empty text string and a cell displaying blank under a custom format are not proof of identical underlying content. Inspect the raw cell and the formula.
• Visual glyphs vs character-count rules: emoji and composed Unicode text have multiple codepoint/UTF-16 representations in some systems; vendor documentation here does not establish equivalence with Excel’s changing Unicode behavior.
• Wrong function: LEFT/RIGHT/MID return text substrings while LEN returns a number. To extract the middle serial digits use MID, not LEN.
• Input as text: ensure the formula begins with = and has the required single argument. Check PlanMaker formula basics.

• Begin worksheet formulas with =. The PlanMaker 2026 formula basics explicitly requires it.
• Arguments in these English-language SoftMaker references use commas. If your installed locale expects different separators or displays a localized function name, use Formula → Function to verify the spelling and separator; no non-English installation was tested here. Quotation marks around literal strings are ordinary formula syntax.
• SoftMaker’s English PlanMaker 2021, 2024 and 2026 manuals document this function. That is evidence of documentation in those editions, not proof of a first-introduced version or identical behavior on FreeOffice, NX, Android, iOS or every operating-system build. PlanMaker’s general 2026 documentation names Windows, macOS, Linux, Android and iOS, but no platform-specific execution was performed.
• A formula in this guide may be a documentation-supported example or an independently calculated expected output; neither is an observed result from native PlanMaker. The specific example tables below are computed from the printed input strings.

These formula names have the same basic text-extraction/counting purpose in Microsoft Excel. For the ordinary ASCII examples in this guide, Excel’s published formulas imply the same outputs. However, do not assume every locale, date/number conversion, Unicode character (especially emoji or surrogate pairs), file-format conversion, or Excel Compatibility Version 2 case behaves identically in PlanMaker. Microsoft’s current documentation describes newer Unicode behavior for some Excel functions; the SoftMaker individual references do not document an equivalent switch. Workbook transfers and target-platform behavior therefore require testing.

The same terminology in LibreOffice/OpenOffice/Google Sheets is not independent proof of perfect compatibility. Check the target application’s functions, formula separators, text encoding and worksheet locale when migrating.

• SoftMaker PlanMaker — function documentation
• SoftMaker IF
• PlanMaker formula basics
• LEN — PlanMaker 2021
• 2024
• LEFT
• RIGHT

Verification status: Official documentation checked; example outcomes were independently reasoned or arithmetically checked where applicable. Not executed in SoftMaker PlanMaker.

• No genuine SoftMaker PlanMaker screenshots are included; this guide does not use mock application images.