How do I use unmerge function in excel on Numbers app?

How does the Unmerge function work?


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Posted on Jan 31, 2025 1:55 PM

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Posted on Feb 1, 2025 6:12 AM

You are misunderstanding what the unmerge operation is. It does not separate text in a cell and place it into separate adjacent cells. Merging takes two or more cells and makes them into one bigger cell. Unmerging does the opposite. The contents will end up in one cell. What you want is either Excel's TEXTSPLIT function or Excel's Text to Columns "wizard". Numbers has neither of these unless it has been added since version 13.1 (the latest I can run). I think there is an AppleScript or a shortcut that has been posted on this forum that will split text like the Excel Text to Columns "wizard" does. If you need a formula approach, REGEX.EXTRACT can be used.


If your text is in column A, put this formula in column B then fill right to get it into C, D, E, etc. for as many words as you need. The word separator is "any white space character" which includes space, tab, form feed, line feed, etc.

=IFERROR(REGEX.EXTRACT($A,"\S+",COLUMN()−COLUMN($A)),"")


COLUMN()−COLUMN($A) calculates a number (1,2,3 and so on) for which word to extract. You can replace COLUMN($A) with a 1 if you like.

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Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Feb 1, 2025 6:12 AM in response to Musicbuddit

You are misunderstanding what the unmerge operation is. It does not separate text in a cell and place it into separate adjacent cells. Merging takes two or more cells and makes them into one bigger cell. Unmerging does the opposite. The contents will end up in one cell. What you want is either Excel's TEXTSPLIT function or Excel's Text to Columns "wizard". Numbers has neither of these unless it has been added since version 13.1 (the latest I can run). I think there is an AppleScript or a shortcut that has been posted on this forum that will split text like the Excel Text to Columns "wizard" does. If you need a formula approach, REGEX.EXTRACT can be used.


If your text is in column A, put this formula in column B then fill right to get it into C, D, E, etc. for as many words as you need. The word separator is "any white space character" which includes space, tab, form feed, line feed, etc.

=IFERROR(REGEX.EXTRACT($A,"\S+",COLUMN()−COLUMN($A)),"")


COLUMN()−COLUMN($A) calculates a number (1,2,3 and so on) for which word to extract. You can replace COLUMN($A) with a 1 if you like.

Jan 31, 2025 7:09 PM in response to Badunit

Thank you for your response.


I’m familiar with that function as well. I’m more proficient with PCs and pretty green on MACs.


What I’m attempting to do - separate a string of data into individual cells.


example: Numbers - Unmerge function - Apple Community


I’m attempting to break data (in blue above) into individual cells. For this example I would have that data broken down into 7 different cells.


Hope this additional info provides details of what I need help with - thanks again.




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How do I use unmerge function in excel on Numbers app?

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