How to remove the diamond with question mark symbol

Excel 2016
When you paste or import data into the Excel spreadsheet, you might notice unusual symbols like a diamond with a question mark. The replacement character � (often a black diamond with a white question mark or an empty square box) represents an unknown, unrecognized, or unrepresentable character:
Diamond with question mark symbol in Excel 365

Unfortunately, you can't remove these symbols using the standard Replace procedure. If you select this symbol and paste it into the Replace dialog box, you see the common space symbol:

Find and Replace dialog box in Excel 365

Even more, if you try to replace it, you will see that Excel replaces all spaces in your spreadsheet:

Find and Replace results in Excel 365

To remove an unknown symbol from the cell or the entire spreadsheet, you need to find the code of this symbol and then substitute it.

To remove the black diamond with the white question mark symbol

Try to use the formula:

= SUBSTITUTE (<cell>, UNICHAR (65533), “”):

Function result in Excel 365

where:

  • The SUBSTITUTE (<text>, <old text>, <new text>) function substitutes <new text> for <old text> in a <text>.
  • The UNICHAR (<numeric value>) function returns the Unicode character that is referenced by the given <numeric value>.

To remove the rectangular with the question mark symbol

Try to use the formula:

= SUBSTITUTE (<cell>, UNICHAR (12), “”):

Function 2 result in Excel 365

To remove any strange symbol from the cell

Use the formula:

= SUBSTITUTE (<cell>, UNICHAR (UNICODE (<character>)), “”):

Universal function result in Excel 365

where:

  • The UNICODE (<character>) function returns the number (code point) corresponding to the first character of the text:
Universal function 2 result in Excel 365

Please, disable AdBlock and reload the page to continue

Today, 30% of our visitors use Ad-Block to block ads.We understand your pain with ads, but without ads, we won't be able to provide you with free content soon. If you need our content for work or study, please support our efforts and disable AdBlock for our site. As you will see, we have a lot of helpful information to share.