How to Combine Text from Multiple Cells in Google Sheets Using CONCATENATE

If you have a spreadsheet with a list of “First Names” in Column A and “Last Names” in Column B, manually retyping them together into a new “Full Name” column is a massive waste of time. Instead, you can use the powerful CONCATENATE function in Google Sheets to instantly merge text from multiple different cells into one single cell.

Using the CONCATENATE Formula

This formula allows you to join cells together and insert custom spacing between them.

1. Open your document in Google Sheets.
2. Click on the empty cell where you want the combined text to appear (for example, cell C2).
3. Type the following formula into the cell:
   =CONCATENATE(A2, " ", B2)
4. Press Enter.

Understanding the Syntax

Let’s break down exactly what that formula is doing so you can customise it for your own data:

• A2: This is the first cell you want to grab text from (e.g., the first name).
• ” “: The quotation marks with a space inside tell Google Sheets to insert a literal blank space between the two words. Without this, the names would be smashed together (e.g., “JohnSmith”).
• B2: This is the second cell you want to append to the end (e.g., the last name).

You can chain as many cells as you want by simply adding more commas. For example, =CONCATENATE(A2, " - ", B2, " - ", C2) would merge three columns with hyphens separating them.