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There's more to number formatting than selecting cells and applying a format. Spreadsheets can
actually apply a lot of number formatting automatically based on the way you enter data. This means
you'll need to enter data in a way the program can understand, and then ensure that those cells
are using the proper number format. For example, the image below shows how to use number

formats correctly for dates, percentages, and times:

Now that you know more about how number formats work, we'll look at a few different number
formats in action.

Percentage Formats

One of the most helpful number formats is the percentage (%) format. It displays values as
percentages, such as 20% or 55%. This is especially helpful when calculating things like the cost of
sales tax or a tip. When you type a percent sign (%) after a number, the percentage number format

will be be applied to that cell automatically.

As you may remember from math class, a percentage can also be written as a decimal. So 15% is
the same thing as 0.15, 7.5% is 0.075, 20% is 0.20, 55% is 0.55, and so on. You can review this
lesson from our Math tutorials to learn more about converting percentages to decimals.

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