For years I have used the LENGTH statement to convert a numeric variable to character, or vice versa, so simple I feel sneaky! Here's the little bit of code: **assume varx is the original numeric variable you want to convert to char**; DATA final; LENGTH $ varx; SET oldfile(RENAME=(varx=vartemp)); varx = vartemp; drop vartemp; run; **on the log will be a warning that you are using a numeric variable to create a character, but it will proceed nicely. You can certainly reverse this, by stating the LENGTH statement for a numeric variable.