Duration.ToText

Duration

Converts a duration value to its text representation.

Syntax

Duration.ToText(duration as nullable duration) as nullable text

Parameters

Name	Type	Required	Description
`duration`	`duration`	Yes	The duration value to convert to text.

Return Value

text — A text string in the format "D.HH:MM:SS" representing the duration, or null if the input is null.

Remarks

Duration.ToText formats a duration value as a text string using the format "D.HH:MM:SS" (days, hours, minutes, seconds). Durations shorter than one day omit the day prefix (e.g., "02:30:00"). Fractional seconds are included when present. This function is the inverse of Duration.FromText and produces the canonical M duration text representation.

If the input is null, the function returns null. The output format is not localized — it always uses . as the day separator and : between time components, regardless of the host culture. This makes it safe for serialization, logging, and round-tripping through Duration.FromText.

Note that the output format (D.HH:MM:SS) is not the same as ISO 8601 duration format (PTxHxMxS). If you need ISO 8601 output, you will need to construct it manually using Duration.Days, Duration.Hours, Duration.Minutes, and Duration.Seconds.

Examples

Example 1: Display duration values as text for a report

Table.AddColumn(
    Table.SelectColumns(
        Table.SelectRows(OrderLog, each [DurationMinutes] <> null),
        {"LogID", "DurationMinutes"}
    ),
    "DurationText",
    each Duration.ToText(#duration(0, 0, [DurationMinutes], 0)),
    type text
)

Result

	LogID	DurationMinutes	DurationText
1	L002	1,725	1.04:45:00
2	L004	2,745	1.21:45:00
3	L006	1,065	0.17:45:00
4	L008	2,670	1.20:30:00

Example 2: Convert a specific duration to text

#table(
    type table [Duration = duration, AsText = text],
    {{#duration(3, 5, 30, 0), Duration.ToText(#duration(3, 5, 30, 0))}}
)

Result

	Duration	AsText
1	3.05:30:00	3.05:30:00

Example 3: Round-trip a duration through text and back

let
    Original = #duration(1, 4, 45, 0),
    AsText = Duration.ToText(Original),
    BackToDuration = Duration.FromText(AsText)
in
    #table(
        type table [Original = duration, AsText = text, Recovered = duration],
        {{Original, AsText, BackToDuration}}
    )

Applied Steps

The final output — a one-row table showing the original duration, its text form, and the recovered duration after round-tripping through text.

	Original	AsText	Recovered
1	1.04:45:00	1.04:45:00	1.04:45:00

Compatibility

✓ Power BI Desktop✓ Power BI Service✓ Excel Desktop✓ Excel Online✓ Dataflows✓ Fabric Notebooks