How to format excel big numbers in rounding them with two significant digits

Question

I would like to format big numbers in Excel in such a way that only the two most significant digits are displayed. Remaining digits would be padded with additional zero.

Example:

1234567 would be displayed as 1 200 000
and
1234 would be displayed as 1 200

Using the format # # " 000" would display 1234567 as 1 235 000 but this is not what I am looking for because it does not scale to one-digit-less numbers. Solutions like 1.2 M is not what I am looking for neither.

The same format should work for both examples. I don't want to round the number, but round the displayed value only (the format).

Answer 1

Perhaps you could use conditional formatting as described here: http://www.wikihow.com/Apply-Conditional-Formatting-in-Excel

so if your number is over 100 and less than 1000 - # # " 00" over 1000 and less than 10000 - # # " 000"

etc etc

Edit - I know the tutorial is for some Mac version of excel, but Conditionl Formatting is still there in my Excel2010

Answer 2

Assuming your value is in A1, the following formula returns the correct result on both of your numbers

=ROUND(A1/POWER(10,LEN(A1)-2),0)*POWER(10,LEN(A1)-2)

In other words, get the number of digits...

LEN(A1)

Get 10^(Number of digits-2)

POWER(10,LEN(A1)-2)

Divide your number by that number

A1/POWER(10,LEN(A1)-2),0)

Round that number to get rid of the decimal

ROUND(A1/POWER(10,LEN(A1)-2),0)

And then multiply by that number to get your final result

=ROUND(A1/POWER(10,LEN(A1)-2),0)*POWER(10,LEN(A1)-2)

You can then use the TEXT formatting to get the format you want. Something like...

=TEXT(ROUND(A1/POWER(10,LEN(A1)-2),0)*POWER(10,LEN(A1)-2),"# ###")

Will probably meet your needs

EDIT: As mentioned in the comment, IF your original value is in a different cell, you can also use the following function for formatting

=CONCATENATE(LEFT(A1,2),REPT("0",LEN(A1)-2))

Answer 3

If the cells you wish to format in this fashion contain values rather than formulas, select the cells and run this tiny macro:

Sub PhancyPhormat()
    Dim r As Range, i As Long, le As Long
    Dim DQ As String
    DQ = Chr(34)
        For Each r In Selection
            s = CStr(r.Value)
            le = Len(s)
            For i = 3 To le
            Mid(s, i, 1) = "0"
        Next i
        phony = DQ & s & DQ & ";;;"
        r.NumberFormat = phony
    Next r
End Sub

You would need to re-run the macro if your change the values.