Rational
Return a month before or after the start date.
Description
The Excel EDATE function returns a future or past month from a given date. For example, =EDATE(“31-03-2016”,-1) returns a leap date 29-02-2016 as 2016 is a leap year.
Syntax
=EDATE(start_date, months)
Parameters
start_date – First date or string of date
months – the number of months before or after the start_date
Return Value
Valid serial date number or date based on the cell format of the result.
Key Notes
- The EDATE function is appropriate for calculating the date of maturity, invoice date, expiration date, fiscal year date and for many other purposes.
- Use the WORKDAY function to find the serial number of the date before or after a specified number of workdays.
- To return a future date or past a specified number of months added or subtracted to the start date.
- The return value of EDATE formula calculates the difference rightly in case of leap year as well.
Keep Reading Similar Functions:

DATE
The DATE function returns a date value using year, month and date, sequentially. I.e.; to merge all 3 date component, =DATE(2012,12,4) returns “04-12-2012”.

WORKDAY
WORKDAY function returns a date based on a given number of working days before and after starting date, to find two days after a date excl. weekends,=WORKDAY(date,2) returns 2.

WORKDAYS.INTL
WORKDAYS.INTL returns a working day before and after a date, excl. custom Weekend days i.e. to find a working day 2 days after a date (01-11-2018-B7) excluding Friday and Saturday, =WORKDAY.INTL(B7,2,7), returns ‘05-11-2018’.