PHPExcel: Leading Zeros

When Excel is detecting a "01" within a cell, Excel interprets this content as a number and it only displays the integer 1 instead of the string "01".

In order to change this behavior, there are generally two possibilities: The first way is to format the cell no longer as number but as string instead. You can do that like the following:

$php->getActiveSheet()
    ->setCellValueExplicit('A1', 
                           '01', 
                           PHPExcel_Cell_DataType::TYPE_STRING);

If it is important for you that the number is further processed as a number by Excel, you can also alternatively change the number formatting of the corresponding cell. In the following example, first, we set the cell A1 to 1, afterwards we are adjusting its formatting:

$php->getActiveSheet()->setCellValue('A1', 1);
$php->getActiveSheet()->getStyle('A1')
                      ->getNumberFormat()
                      ->setFormatCode('00');

In your case, you have to specify "00". If the numbers are longer or if you want more zeros to be displayed, you have to pass "000", "0000" or accordingly just your desired number of digits.
Last update on 2024-01-12 | Created on 2016-12-21