Translate an Excel file into Romanian

What changes when a spreadsheet goes into Romanian

Romanian is a Latin language, close to French in length. Coming from English, which is fairly compact, expect labels to run somewhat longer; coming from French, Spanish or Italian, column widths will feel much the same. A few features of Romanian deserve attention in a spreadsheet:

• The letters ș and ț take a comma below. Many files wrongly contain ş and ţ with a cedilla, which are different characters. To Excel, "Preț" and "Preţ" are two different strings, so a filter, sort or search can split them apart.
• The other diacritics (ă, â, î) matter: "tara" instead of "țara" is a different word.
• Months and weekdays are lower case: a "January" header becomes "ianuarie".
• Plurals follow three categories (one, few, other): "1 produs", "2 produse", but "20 de produse" from twenty upwards. A fixed label such as "items" next to a counter cannot always be right.
• Quotation marks open low and close high: „Total”.

What Manuce returns, and what it leaves alone

You get your original .xlsx back with the text replaced in place. Column widths, colours, borders, number formats, filters and merged cells are preserved. A calculated cell keeps its formula and keeps calculating: =SUM(D2:D40) still gives the same total under a header that now reads "Total general". You also receive a Word version, a PDF and the plain text, handy for review by a Romanian-speaking colleague.

Not translated:

• sheet tab names ("Q1 Sales" stays "Q1 Sales"), which at least means no reference such as ='Q1 Sales'!B4 is broken;
• cell comments;
• charts (titles, legends, axes);
• shapes and text boxes placed on the sheet.

Another limit: narrow columns are not widened. If "Qty" becomes "Cantitate", it may be cut off on screen, just as overlong text would have been in the original. Finally, Manuce does not produce sworn or certified translations: if a Romanian authority requires a certified translation of a statement or accounts, you will need an accredited translator.

The trap: text written inside formulas

Because formulas are left untouched, any text inside them stays in the source language. This is the first thing to check in a workbook meant for Romanian readers:

• =IF(E2="Paid","OK","Chase"): once E2 is translated to "Plătit", the comparison with "Paid" fails and every row shows "Chase".
• ="Total: "&B2&" items": the result will appear in English in the middle of a Romanian sheet.

Find these formulas before you upload. The simplest fix is to move the text into ordinary cells (a small lookup table, for instance) and point the formula at them: those cells get translated and the formula keeps working.

Numbers, dates and lei: what stays as it is

Numbers, dates and amounts are not converted. Romanian convention uses a decimal comma, a full stop for thousands (1.250,50) and day.month.year dates. For cells in standard formats, the separators shown depend on the regional settings of the computer opening the file, not on the translation. A custom format containing literal text, such as a "GBP" or "USD" suffix, will display unchanged.

If amounts need to appear in lei (RON), the conversion and the currency symbol are up to you: Manuce recalculates nothing and does not alter number formats.

Preparing and checking your workbook

• Before uploading, move any text you want translated out of comments, text boxes or chart titles and into cells.
• Search for cedillas (ş, ţ) in any Romanian data already present and replace them with ș and ț, so filters and lookups group identical values together.
• Check the font: an old or decorative typeface may lack ș and ț and show an empty box instead.
• After delivery, go through each sheet, widen columns where text is clipped, rename tabs into Romanian if needed (checking any formulas that cite them) and test the filters.

Romanian carries a language supplement (a ×1.25 coefficient on the per-word rate), which the quote shows as soon as you upload.

In practice

1. Find formulas containing text and move that text into cells.
2. Upload the .xlsx file and choose Romanian: the quote is based on the exact word count.
3. Read the free sample translated at your chosen level, then pay.
4. Download the translated workbook plus the Word, PDF and plain-text versions.
5. Check clipped columns and filters, and rename tabs if needed.