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Join several cells with a separator

Combine a range of cells into one string with a chosen separator, skipping the blank ones automatically instead of stacking commas.

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Your formula

=TEXTJOIN(", ", TRUE, A2:A6)

Works in both Excel and Google Sheets unless the fine print below says otherwise.

Why it's built this way

  • The second argument, ignore_empty, is the reason to reach for TEXTJOIN over CONCATENATE or &: set it TRUE and a blank cell in the range is skipped entirely, instead of leaving a bare delimiter sitting where it was.
  • TEXTJOIN accepts a whole range as its third argument, not a cell-by-cell list — CONCATENATE and & both require every cell spelled out individually.
  • The delimiter can be more than one character, so the joined text reads naturally instead of needing a cleanup pass afterward.

The fine print

  • TEXTJOIN was added in Excel 2019/365 and Google Sheets, but isn't available in Excel 2016 or earlier — CONCATENATE or & is the fallback there.
  • The delimiter only appears BETWEEN values, never at the start or end, so joining a single non-empty cell produces no stray separator.
  • ignore_empty must be a boolean (TRUE/FALSE) or 1/0 — typing the word "true" as literal text is not the same thing and errors.

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