Compatibility Versions

Compatibility Versions contain improvements to Excel functions that update based on a workbook setting. This will allow you to access these improvements, while ensuring that your workbooks will continue to work as expected. Each version contains all changes from previous versions.

New workbooks in the Current Channel will be set to Version 2 (as of April 2026). See the table below for specifics by release channel.

Compatibility Versions

Workbooks that predated this feature are treated as being Version 1.

Version	Functions with changes	Description of changes	Excel Versions that have access
Version 1	N/A (Compatible with legacy Excel)		All versions
Version 2 (Recommended on Current Channel)	LEN, MID, FIND, SEARCH and REPLACE functions	Support for Unicode surrogate pairs	Excel for M365

Version 2: Details for Unicode surrogate pair support

In Version 2, many emoji and special characters that were previously counted as two characters are now counted as one. For example, LEN("😀") returns 1 instead of 2.

Note: Some emoji are made up of multiple characters combined together (for example, emoji with skin tone modifiers or variation selectors). These components are still counted separately. If a result seems unexpected, the character you are looking at may be a combination of multiple characters rather than a single one.

Setting Compatibility Version through the Formulas tab

You can set a workbook's compatibility version through Formulas > Calculation Options > Compatibility Version

Supported and Recommended Compatibility Versions by Release Channel

For Excel 2024 and previous, the highest available Compatibility Version is Version 1 and the Recommended Version is Version 1.

Release Channel	Highest Available Compat. Version	Recommended Version (Version for new workbooks)
Beta	Version 2	Version 2
Preview	Version 2	Version 2
Current	Version 2	Version 2 (as of April 2026)
Monthly Enterprise	Version 2	Version 1
Semi-Annual Enterprise	Version 2	Version 1