BASE in Zoho Sheet: Convert Numbers to Binary, Hex and Base 36

• Introduced: The original introduction version and date are not established by the checked sources.
• Availability: Currently documented in Zoho Sheet’s rolling web-service help; no numbered release or retirement endpoint is established.
• Scope: English-language web-service documentation. Mobile and offline-client parity is outside the verified scope.
• Checked: October 14, 2026, against the official BASE reference. Documentation check; not a new native test.

=BASE(number; radix; [min_length])

Use the semicolon argument separators shown in Zoho’s English official reference. Worksheet-specific regional and locale settings may alter number formats; do not assume that a formula copied from another application will parse unchanged in every locale. Zoho BASE; Zoho spreadsheet locale settings.

BASE is documented in the Text functions category. min_length is a lower bound, not a character-count cap: an output naturally longer than the requested minimum is not shortened. The official page does not establish the maximum permissible input number, exact handling of negative inputs, or all decimal-to-integer rounding rules. Those should not be borrowed from Excel’s independent specification.

The first three rows below are directly supported by Zoho’s published examples. The remaining rows are independently calculated using positional notation; they are expected outcomes, not Zoho engine test results.

The quotation marks around results in prose merely show that results are strings; they are not literal quote characters returned by BASE. In a cell formatted as text, 00FF will stay a four-character label rather than a usable base-ten amount. Zoho BASE examples.

Build a test sheet from scratch

In A1 type Decimal, B1 Radix, C1 Minimum length, and D1 Encoded text. Enter the values 255, 16, 4 across A2:C2; 100, 2, 8 in row 3; and 1295, 36, an empty C4 in row 4. In D2 enter =BASE(A2;B2;C2); copy that pattern to D3. In D4 enter =BASE(A4;B4) so that you truly omit the optional third argument. Independent targets: D2 00FF, D3 01100100, D4 ZZ. Keep all input columns numeric; D is returned text.

For an immediate sanity check, manually verify FF: the two digits mean 15 × 16 + 15 = 255. For 01100100, the set bits correspond to 64 + 32 + 4 = 100. A worksheet result that differs should be inspected before using it to produce real business identifiers.

Fixed-width hex identifiers. If column A holds a nonnegative counter, =BASE(A2;16;6) produces hexadecimal text with at least six characters. Counter 255 should become 0000FF. This is useful for an export field that requires fixed-width labels; it is not encryption, randomization, or a guarantee that the code will remain globally unique. Specify the column width in the recipient system separately, because if the counter eventually exceeds six hexadecimal characters, BASE does not truncate it.

Binary flags for a teaching worksheet. Store decimal amounts in A2:A10 and use =BASE(A2;2;8) in B2. An expected example is 13 → 00001101. Read the result right-to-left: 8 + 4 + 1. BASE handles representation but does not document two’s-complement signed behavior; use explicit signed-number rules in separate instructions rather than assuming negative values work.

Round-trip checking. Zoho also publishes DECIMAL(number; radix) for converting a radix-encoded text value back into a base-ten number. Independently, =DECIMAL(BASE(255;16;4);16) should give 255. This is a useful spreadsheet audit: if the returned numeric value differs, suspect the radix, invalid characters, or unexpected rounding. Do not claim the nested formula has been executed in Zoho. Zoho DECIMAL.

Storage and downstream systems. Use two columns when possible: original decimal in A and BASE text in B. A business might want to sort numerically by A, display a hexadecimal code from B, and keep a verified original to reconcile later. Text sorting, arithmetic, and numeric sorting are not identical operations. A base-16 string such as A0 is not automatically recognized as decimal 160 by every import workflow.

The five spreadsheet error names come from Zoho’s BASE documentation; this table distinguishes a generic error glossary from a function-specific guarantee. Zoho BASE errors.

Zoho documentation: The public English cloud help page documents the function, semicolon-separated syntax, radix range and min-length padding; no signed-input limit or historical introduction version is stated there. Independent mathematics: the extra conversion examples above use base arithmetic, not a logged-in Zoho spreadsheet. Other product evidence: Microsoft documents a similarly named Excel BASE function but additionally specifies input and string-length constraints of its own. Those Microsoft constraints are not verified Zoho constraints. Microsoft BASE reference.

Zoho provides browser formula entry as well as Android and iOS generic function-entry instructions, but these sources do not certify this particular function in every app build, account tier or offline condition. Do not promise a specific minimum Zoho release or mobile calculation parity. Zoho inserting functions; Android guide; iOS guide.

Zoho DECIMAL reverses an unsigned positional representation; Zoho BIN2DEC is more specialized for up to ten binary digits; Zoho DEC2BIN creates a binary representation but has its own signed input range. Do not substitute any of these functions without checking their limits. All four official references and the locale help were checked on 2026-10-13. The examples have not been executed in native Zoho Sheet.