This guide explains how you can enter the current date and time in the LibreOffice Calc worksheet.
And it’s very easy.
Table of Contents
Enter Current Date
You can use TODAY() function to enter today’s date. This function doesn’t take any argument. You can enter it to any cell to show the current date.
Remember, whenever you open the Calc spreadsheet, the date is updated with the current date.
Enter Current Time
To enter the current time, use the NOW() and TODAY() function both. Like the TODAY() function, NOW() also updates whenever the Calc sheet is recalculated. LibreOffice Calc sheet is recalculated almost every time you perform any activity – typing, saving, opening, etc. If you want to manually update, press F9.
If you enter only NOW() it will give you the date and time together. The date format should be based on LibreOffice profile, country – language settings. Same for the time as well.
To get the current time, use NOW() - TODAY() as a formaula as below.
But as you can see, it is a decimal number because LibreOffice Calc represents time as a number between 0 and 1. To convert it to a time, you have to apply a time format. Learn more about formatting cells.
Static Date and Time with Keyboard Shortcut
Ubuntu, Linux Mint and others
- To enter a current date as a static date, press
CTRL+;(semicolon). It will insert today’s date as a static value in the corresponding cell. - Similarly, to enter the current time as a static value, press
CTRL+SHIFT+;.
Windows
- To enter a current date as a static date, press
CTRL+;(semicolon). It will insert today’s date as a static value in the corresponding cell. - Similarly, to enter the current time as a static value, press
CTRL+SHIFT+;.
macOS
- In macOS, to enter current date as static date, press
COMMAND ⌘+; - There is no shortcuts for entering current time in macOS as per my knowledge.
Closing notes
I hope this guide helped you to understand the current date and time, including its static value in the LibreOffice Calc sheet.
This command doesn´t work: “To enter a current date as a static date, press CTRL+; (semicolon). It will insert today’s date as a static value in the corresponding cell.” 2020 12 28
Any people on a gnome/ubuntu distribution having a problem might benefit from referencing: Ctrl+; doesn’t insert current date in LibreOffice Calc
If you’re affected solution is to type ibus-setup in terminal, go to emoji tab, and remove the ctrl semicolon entry.
Yes it works. Make sure you are pressing CTRL and while holding the CTRL key, press semicolon.
Please flag windows specific stuff appropriately.
On a mac, command+; is the shortcut for current date. By default, there is no short cut for current time.
I do not have a mac. But are you saying CTRL+; doesn’t work in Calc on mac?
When I press CTRL+; then press enter, it will go to Adjacent cell, and when I press CTRL+SHIFt+;, the time comes in another cell!
In case of international keybord ; = shift + ,
So you run out of luck with this guide.
hey there, your provided formula is working but if i apply in any other cell last cell time is also changing simultaneously
why?
HOW TO ADD PAST DATE?
You can simple subtract the number of today’s from a date. For example A1-1 should give you one day before date from the date present in A1
How do I write this in a cell:
This sheet was last accessed on <input date and time>.
The last access date/time is part of operating system. Hence it require a macro to access.