HI,

Have you selected the right axis?

Are your values text or dates?

Or could you send a dummy

Regards

Hello,

check that the data in the source table is really dates, not dates that look like text.  The X axis labels seem to be in the format yyyy/mm/dd, which is a quite unusual format for a default date. Therefore, the data is most likely text.

You can convert it to a date with a formula. Try

=Datevalue(A1)

If that returns a number like 41697, format the cell to your short date format.

If Datevalue() does not recognize the date, you can use this formula:

=DATE(LEFT(A1,4),MID(A1,6,2),RIGHT(A1,2))

Copy down your table. Then copy the results and use Paste Special > Values to paste over the original date (text) data.

cheers, teylyn

Yep - they're definitely dates...

? typename(activecell.Value)
Date

I tried this on other fields as well with numerical values.  Can't change those either.

Didn't even know that was an option.
But alas, changing it to a "Date axis" does not solve the problem.
Are you able to get date fields to work this way in a chart?

You say you cannot format any other number either?  Could you possibly post the file for inspection?

Create a copy of the file, replace confidential data with dummy data. Leave the dates as is.

Fair enough.

OK - here's a fresh file with two tables.
I've formatted the columns in the source and the pivots each a different way.
The style you see in the chart right now is the number format that was on the data in the source columns when I built the tables.
Any subsequent changes do not get reflected on refresh.
Also, if I try to change the number settings in the axis properties pane, the settings don't stick.
As soon as I put the focus back on the sheet, any changes to the settings vanish.
Changing the axis type to "Date" also has no effect.

Book2.xlsx

My first thought was - great, problem solved.
My second thought.... it can't be this easy - I would have figured it out.
Alas, it's not this easy.  Take a look at this image.
This is from the original file.
The number format button doesn't appear in the dialog.
Not sure if it's relevant, but the source data for this pivot is a "table" range (formerly known as a "list") on a different sheet (not from the data model).

Again, I would like to see the file. The problem does not occur in your 2.9 MB sample file with 29,000 rows of data.

In your original question you did not mention that it was a pivot chart. But that was the key to the solution.

Maybe you are forgetting to mention some other important factors here as well.

Create a copy of the file. Reduce the original data to a few hundred rows. PLEASE, there is NO NEED TO POST 30,000 ROWS of data. Replace all text with "dummy", for all I care. Then the numbers can stay as they are and you don't have to manipulate them. Post that file.

Perhaps.  I did not expect it mattered whether it was a pivot chart or not, but you may be on to something.  I'll post the file in a few minutes.

Solved problem