Excel cell formats

Yes. Excel has a Text cell format.

When a cell is formatted as Text, Excel treats entries as text even if they look like numbers. This is the recommended way to preserve things like leading zeros or long number codes.

To apply it in Excel for Windows:

1. Select the cell or range.
2. Go to Home.
3. In the Number group, open the Number Format list.
4. Select Text.

A few important details:

• Numbers entered after the format is applied are stored as text.
• Text-formatted entries are typically left-aligned in the cell.
• For values with 16 digits or more, using Text is important because Excel has a maximum of 15 digits of precision for numbers.
• If a value has already been entered as a number, changing the format to Text does not necessarily convert that existing value; formatting first is the safer approach.
• A leading apostrophe is another way to force text, but it is not required if the cell is already formatted as Text.

References:

• Format numbers as text
• Available number formats in Excel
• Keeping leading zeros and large numbers
• Using a leading single quote - Microsoft Q&A In Excel parlance, what is using a leading single quote to display an entry verbatim? E.g., escape character, format mark, etc.