What RIGHT does
RIGHT extracts characters from the end of a text string. It is a good fit when the part you need is always attached to the right side of an ID, code, or label.
Practical examples
Return the last four characters
=RIGHT(A2,4)
This is useful for pulling suffixes, years, region codes, or the last digits of an identifier.
Default to a single character
=RIGHT(A2)
If you omit the second argument, RIGHT returns the final character only.
Common mistakes and notes
RIGHT returns text
Even if the extracted characters look numeric, Excel treats them as text until you convert them.
Fixed-length assumptions matter
RIGHT works best when the part you want always has the same length. If lengths vary, the extraction logic needs more context.