Most used excel functions

Below is a brief overview of about 100 important Excel functions you should know, with links to detailed examples. We also have a large list of example formulas, a more complete list of Excel functions, and video training. If you are new to Excel formulas, see this introduction.

Note: Excel now includes Dynamic Array formulas, which offer important new functions.

Date and Time Functions

Excel provides many functions to work with dates and times. 

NOW and TODAY

You can get the current date with the TODAY function and the current date and time with the NOW Function. Technically, the NOW function returns the current date and time, but you can format as time only, as seen below:

TODAY() // returns current date
NOW() // returns current time

Note: these are volatile functions and will recalculate with every worksheet change. If you want a static value, use date and time shortcuts.

DAY, MONTH, YEAR, and DATE

You can use the DAY, MONTH, and YEAR functions to disassemble any date into its raw components, and the DATE function to put things back together again.

=DAY("14-Nov-2018") // returns 14
=MONTH("14-Nov-2018") // returns 11
=YEAR("14-Nov-2018") // returns 2018
=DATE(2018,11,14) // returns 14-Nov-2018

HOUR, MINUTE, SECOND, and TIME

Excel provides a set of parallel functions for times. You can use the HOUR, MINUTE, and SECOND functions to extract pieces of a time, and you can assemble a TIME from individual components with the TIME function.

=HOUR("10:30") // returns 10
=MINUTE("10:30") // returns 30
=SECOND("10:30") // returns 0
=TIME(10,30,0) // returns 10:30

DATEDIF and YEARFRAC

You can use the DATEDIF function to get time between dates in years, months, or days. DATEDIF can also be configured to get total time in «normalized» denominations, i.e. «2 years and 6 months and 27 days».

Use YEARFRAC to get fractional years:

=YEARFRAC("14-Nov-2018","10-Jun-2021") // returns 2.57

EDATE and EOMONTH

A common task with dates is to shift a date forward (or backward) by a given number of months. You can use the EDATE and EOMONTH functions for this. EDATE moves by month and retains the day. EOMONTH works the same way, but always returns the last day of the month.

EDATE(date,6) // 6 months forward
EOMONTH(date,6) // 6 months forward (end of month)

WORKDAY and NETWORKDAYS

To figure out a date n working days in the future, you can use the WORKDAY function. To calculate the number of workdays between two dates, you can use NETWORKDAYS.

WORKDAY(start,n,holidays) // date n workdays in future

Video: How to calculate due dates with WORKDAY

NETWORKDAYS(start,end,holidays) // number of workdays between dates

Note: Both functions automatically skip weekends (Saturday and Sunday) and will also skip holidays, if provided. If you need more flexibility on what days are considered weekends, see the WORKDAY.INTL function and NETWORKDAYS.INTL function. 

WEEKDAY and WEEKNUM

To figure out the day of week from a date, Excel provides the WEEKDAY function. WEEKDAY returns a number between 1-7 that indicates Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, etc. Use the WEEKNUM function to get the week number in a given year.

=WEEKDAY(date) // returns a number 1-7
=WEEKNUM(date) // returns week number in year

Engineering

CONVERT

Most Engineering functions are pretty technical…you’ll find a lot of functions for complex numbers in this section. However, the CONVERT function is quite useful for everyday unit conversions. You can use CONVERT to change units for distance, weight, temperature, and much more.

=CONVERT(72,"F","C") // returns 22.2

Information Functions

ISBLANK, ISERROR, ISNUMBER, and ISFORMULA

Excel provides many functions for checking the value in a cell, including ISNUMBER,  ISTEXT, ISLOGICAL, ISBLANK, ISERROR, and ISFORMULA  These functions are sometimes called the «IS» functions, and they all return TRUE or FALSE based on a cell’s contents.

Excel also has ISODD and ISEVEN functions that will test a number to see if it’s even or odd.

By the way, the green fill in the screenshot above is applied automatically with a conditional formatting formula.

Logical Functions

Excel’s logical functions are a key building block of many advanced formulas. Logical functions return the boolean values TRUE or FALSE. If you need a primer on logical formulas, this video goes through many examples.

AND, OR and NOT

The core of Excel’s logical functions are the AND function, the OR function, and the NOT function. In the screen below, each of these function is used to run a simple test on the values in column B:

=AND(B5>3,B5<9)
=OR(B5=3,B5=9)
=NOT(B5=2)

• Video: How to build logical formulas
• Guide: 50 examples of formula criteria

IFERROR and IFNA

The IFERROR function and IFNA function can be used as a simple way to trap and handle errors. In the screen below, VLOOKUP is used to retrieve cost from a menu item. Column F contains just a VLOOKUP function, with no error handling. Column G shows how to use IFNA with VLOOKUP to display a custom message when an unrecognized item is entered.

=VLOOKUP(E5,menu,2,0) // no error trapping
=IFNA(VLOOKUP(E5,menu,2,0),"Not found") // catch errors

Whereas IFNA only catches an #N/A error, the IFERROR function will catch any formula error.

IF and IFS functions

The IF function is one of the most used functions in Excel. In the screen below, IF checks test scores and assigns «pass» or «fail»:

Multiple IF functions can be nested together to perform more complex logical tests.

New in Excel 2019 and Excel 365, the IFS function can run multiple logical tests without nesting IFs.

=IFS(C5<60,"F",C5<70,"D",C5<80,"C",C5<90,"B",C5>=90,"A")

Lookup and Reference Functions

VLOOKUP and HLOOKUP

Excel offers a number of functions to lookup and retrieve data. Most famous of all is VLOOKUP:

=VLOOKUP(C5,$F$5:$G$7,2,TRUE)

More: 23 things to know about VLOOKUP.

HLOOKUP works like VLOOKUP, but expects data arranged horizontally:

=HLOOKUP(C5,$G$4:$I$5,2,TRUE)

INDEX and MATCH

For more complicated lookups, INDEX and MATCH offers more flexibility and power:

=INDEX(C5:E12,MATCH(H4,B5:B12,0),MATCH(H5,C4:E4,0))

Both the INDEX function and the MATCH function are powerhouse functions that turn up in all kinds of formulas.

More: How to use INDEX and MATCH

LOOKUP

The LOOKUP function has default behaviors that make it useful when solving certain problems. LOOKUP assumes values are sorted in ascending order and always performs an approximate match. When LOOKUP can’t find a match, it will match the next smallest value. In the example below we are using LOOKUP to find the last entry in a column:

ROW and COLUMN

You can use the ROW function and COLUMN function to find row and column numbers on a worksheet. Notice both ROW and COLUMN return values for the current cell if no reference is supplied:

The row function also shows up often in advanced formulas that process data with relative row numbers.

ROWS and COLUMNS

The ROWS function and COLUMNS function provide a count of rows in a reference. In the screen below, we are counting rows and columns in an Excel Table named «Table1».

Note ROWS returns a count of data rows in a table, excluding the header row. By the way, here are 23 things to know about Excel Tables.

HYPERLINK

You can use the HYPERLINK function to construct a link with a formula. Note HYPERLINK lets you build both external links and internal links:

=HYPERLINK(C5,B5)

GETPIVOTDATA

The GETPIVOTDATA function is useful for retrieving information from existing pivot tables.

=GETPIVOTDATA("Sales",$B$4,"Region",I6,"Product",I7)

CHOOSE

The CHOOSE function is handy any time you need to make a choice based on a number:

=CHOOSE(2,"red","blue","green") // returns "blue"

Video: How to use the CHOOSE function

TRANSPOSE

The TRANSPOSE function gives you an easy way to transpose vertical data to horizontal, and vice versa.

{=TRANSPOSE(B4:C9)}

Note: TRANSPOSE is a formula and is, therefore, dynamic. If you just need to do a one-time transpose operation, use Paste Special instead.

OFFSET

The OFFSET function is useful for all kinds of dynamic ranges. From a starting location, it lets you specify row and column offsets, and also the final row and column size. The result is a range that can respond dynamically to changing conditions and inputs. You can feed this range to other functions, as in the screen below, where OFFSET builds a range that is fed to the SUM function:

=SUM(OFFSET(B4,1,I4,4,1)) // sum of Q3

INDIRECT

The INDIRECT function allows you to build references as text. This concept is a bit tricky to understand at first, but it can be useful in many situations. Below, we are using INDIRECT to get values from cell A1 in 5 different worksheets. Each reference is dynamic. If a sheet name changes, the reference will update.

=INDIRECT(B5&"!A1") // =Sheet1!A1

The INDIRECT function is also used to «lock» references so they won’t change, when rows or columns are added or deleted. For more details, see linked examples at the bottom of the INDIRECT function page.

Caution: both OFFSET and INDIRECT are volatile functions and can slow down large or complicated spreadsheets.

STATISTICAL Functions

COUNT and COUNTA

You can count numbers with the COUNT function and non-empty cells with COUNTA. You can count blank cells with COUNTBLANK, but in the screen below we are counting blank cells with COUNTIF, which is more generally useful.

=COUNT(B5:F5) // count numbers
=COUNTA(B5:F5) // count numbers and text
=COUNTIF(B5:F5,"") // count blanks

COUNTIF and COUNTIFS

For conditional counts, the COUNTIF function can apply one criteria. The COUNTIFS function can apply multiple criteria at the same time:

=COUNTIF(C5:C12,"red") // count red
=COUNTIF(F5:F12,">50") // count total > 50
=COUNTIFS(C5:C12,"red",D5:D12,"TX") // red and tx
=COUNTIFS(C5:C12,"blue",F5:F12,">50") // blue > 50

Video: How to use the COUNTIF function

SUM, SUMIF, SUMIFS

To sum everything, use the SUM function. To sum conditionally, use SUMIF or SUMIFS. Following the same pattern as the counting functions, the SUMIF function can apply only one criteria while the SUMIFS function can apply multiple criteria.

=SUM(F5:F12) // everything
=SUMIF(C5:C12,"red",F5:F12) // red only
=SUMIF(F5:F12,">50") // over 50
=SUMIFS(F5:F12,C5:C12,"red",D5:D12,"tx") // red & tx
=SUMIFS(F5:F12,C5:C12,"blue",F5:F12,">50") // blue & >50

Video: How to use the SUMIF function

AVERAGE, AVERAGEIF, and AVERAGEIFS

Following the same pattern, you can calculate an average with AVERAGE, AVERAGEIF, and AVERAGEIFS.

=AVERAGE(F5:F12) // all
=AVERAGEIF(C5:C12,"red",F5:F12) // red only
=AVERAGEIFS(F5:F12,C5:C12,"red",D5:D12,"tx") // red and tx

MIN, MAX, LARGE, SMALL

You can find largest and smallest values with MAX and MIN, and nth largest and smallest values with LARGE and SMALL. In the screen below, data is the named range C5:C13, used in all formulas.

=MAX(data) // largest
=MIN(data) // smallest
=LARGE(data,1) // 1st largest
=LARGE(data,2) // 2nd largest
=LARGE(data,3) // 3rd largest
=SMALL(data,1) // 1st smallest
=SMALL(data,2) // 2nd smallest
=SMALL(data,3) // 3rd smallest

Video: How to find the nth smallest or largest value

MINIFS, MAXIFS

The MINIFS and MAXIFS. These functions let you find minimum and maximum values with conditions:

=MAXIFS(D5:D15,C5:C15,"female") // highest female
=MAXIFS(D5:D15,C5:C15,"male") // highest male
=MINIFS(D5:D15,C5:C15,"female") // lowest female
=MINIFS(D5:D15,C5:C15,"male") // lowest male

Note: MINIFS and MAXIFS are new in Excel via Office 365 and Excel 2019.

MODE

The MODE function returns the most commonly occurring number in a range:

=MODE(B5:G5) // returns 1

RANK

To rank values largest to smallest, or smallest to largest, use the RANK function:

Video: How to rank values with the RANK function

MATH Functions

ABS

To change negative values to positive use the ABS function.

=ABS(-134.50) // returns 134.50

RAND and RANDBETWEEN

Both the RAND function and RANDBETWEEN function can generate random numbers on the fly. RAND creates long decimal numbers between zero and 1. RANDBETWEEN generates random integers between two given numbers.

=RAND() // between zero and 1
=RANDBETWEEN(1,100) // between 1 and 100

ROUND, ROUNDUP, ROUNDDOWN, INT

To round values up or down, use the ROUND function. To force rounding up to a given number of digits, use ROUNDUP. To force rounding down, use ROUNDDOWN. To discard the decimal part of a number altogether, use the INT function.

=ROUND(11.777,1) // returns 11.8
=ROUNDUP(11.777) // returns 11.8
=ROUNDDOWN(11.777,1) // returns 11.7
=INT(11.777) // returns 11

MROUND, CEILING, FLOOR

To round values to the nearest multiple use the MROUND function. The FLOOR function and CEILING function also round to a given multiple. FLOOR forces rounding down, and CEILING forces rounding up.

=MROUND(13.85,.25) // returns 13.75
=CEILING(13.85,.25) // returns 14
=FLOOR(13.85,.25) // returns 13.75

MOD

The MOD function returns the remainder after division. This sounds boring and geeky, but MOD turns up in all kinds of formulas, especially formulas that need to do something «every nth time». In the screen below, you can see how MOD returns zero every third number when the divisor is 3:

SUMPRODUCT

The SUMPRODUCT function is a powerful and versatile tool when dealing with all kinds of data. You can use SUMPRODUCT to easily count and sum based on criteria, and you can use it in elegant ways that just don’t work with COUNTIFS and SUMIFS. In the screen below, we are using SUMPRODUCT to count and sum orders in March. See the SUMPRODUCT page for details and links to many examples.

=SUMPRODUCT(--(MONTH(B5:B12)=3)) // count March
=SUMPRODUCT(--(MONTH(B5:B12)=3),C5:C12) // sum March

SUBTOTAL

The SUBTOTAL function is an «aggregate function» that can perform a number of operations on a set of data. All told, SUBTOTAL can perform 11 operations, including SUM, AVERAGE, COUNT, MAX, MIN, etc. (see this page for the full list). The key feature of SUBTOTAL is that it will ignore rows that have been «filtered out» of an Excel Table, and, optionally, rows that have been manually hidden. In the screen below, SUBTOTAL is used to count and sum only the 7 visible rows in the table:

=SUBTOTAL(3,B5:B14) // returns 7
=SUBTOTAL(9,F5:F14) // returns 9.54

AGGREGATE

Like SUBTOTAL, the AGGREGATE function can also run a number of aggregate operations on a set of data and can optionally ignore hidden rows. The key differences are that AGGREGATE can run more operations (19 total) and can also ignore errors.

In the screen below, AGGREGATE is used to perform MIN, MAX, LARGE and SMALL operations while ignoring errors. Normally, the error in cell B9 would prevent these functions from returning a result. See this page for a full list of operations AGGREGATE can perform.

=AGGREGATE(4,6,values) // MAX ignore errors, returns 100
=AGGREGATE(5,6,values) // MIN ignore errors, returns 75

TEXT Functions

LEFT, RIGHT, MID

To extract characters from the left, right, or middle of text, use LEFT, RIGHT, and MID functions:

=LEFT("ABC-1234-RED",3) // returns "ABC"
=MID("ABC-1234-RED",5,4) // returns "1234"
=RIGHT("ABC-1234-RED",3) // returns "RED"

LEN

The LEN function will return the length of a text string. LEN shows up in a lot of formulas that count words or characters.

FIND, SEARCH

To look for specific text in a cell, use the FIND function or SEARCH function. These functions return the numeric position of matching text, but SEARCH allows wildcards and FIND is case-sensitive. Both functions will throw an error when text is not found, so wrap in the ISNUMBER function to return TRUE or FALSE (example here).

=FIND("Better the devil you know","devil") // returns 12
=SEARCH("This is not my beautiful wife","bea*") // returns 12

REPLACE, SUBSTITUTE

To replace text by position, use the REPLACE function. To replace text by matching, use the SUBSTITUTE function. In the first example, REPLACE removes the two asterisks (**) by replacing the first two characters with an empty string («»). In the second example, SUBSTITUTE removes all hash characters (#) by replacing «#» with «».

=REPLACE("**Red",1,2,"") // returns "Red"
=SUBSTITUTE("##Red##","#","") // returns "Red"

CODE, CHAR

To figure out the numeric code for a character, use the CODE function. To translate the numeric code back to a character, use the CHAR function. In the example below, CODE translates each character in column B to its corresponding code. In column F, CHAR translates the code back to a character.

=CODE("a") // returns 97
=CHAR(97) // returns "a"

Video: How to use the CODE and CHAR functions

TRIM, CLEAN

To get rid of extra space in text, use the TRIM function. To remove line breaks and other non-printing characters, use CLEAN.

=TRIM(A1) // remove extra space
=CLEAN(A1) // remove line breaks

Video: How to clean text with TRIM and CLEAN

CONCAT, TEXTJOIN, CONCATENATE

New in Excel  via Office 365 are CONCAT and TEXTJOIN. The CONCAT function lets you concatenate (join) multiple values, including a range of values without a delimiter. The TEXTJOIN function does the same thing, but allows you to specify a delimiter and can also ignore empty values.

=TEXTJOIN(",",TRUE,B4:H4) // returns "red,blue,green,pink,black"
=CONCAT(B7:H7) // returns "8675309"

Excel also provides the CONCATENATE function, but it doesn’t offer special features. I wouldn’t bother with it and would instead concatenate directly with the ampersand (&) character in a formula.

EXACT

The EXACT function allows you to compare two text strings in a case-sensitive manner.

UPPER, LOWER, PROPER

To change the case of text, use the UPPER, LOWER, and PROPER function

=UPPER("Sue BROWN") // returns "SUE BROWN"
=LOWER("Sue BROWN") // returns "sue brown"
=PROPER("Sue BROWN") // returns "Sue Brown"

Video: How to change case with formulas

TEXT

Last but definitely not least is the TEXT function. The text function lets you apply number formatting to numbers (including dates, times, etc.) as text. This is especially useful when you need to embed a formatted number in a message, like «Sale ends on [date]».

=TEXT(B5,"$#,##0.00") 
=TEXT(B6,"000000")
="Save "&TEXT(B7,"0%")
="Sale ends "&TEXT(B8,"mmm d")

More: Detailed examples of custom number formatting.

Dynamic Array functions

Dynamic arrays are new in Excel 365, and are a major upgrade to Excel’s formula engine. As part of the dynamic array update, Excel includes new functions which directly leverage dynamic arrays to solve problems that are traditionally hard to solve with conventional formulas. If you are using Excel 365, make sure you are aware of these new functions:

Function	Purpose
FILTER	Filter data and return matching records
RANDARRAY	Generate array of random numbers
SEQUENCE	Generate array of sequential numbers
SORT	Sort range by column
SORTBY	Sort range by another range or array
UNIQUE	Extract unique values from a list or range
XLOOKUP	Modern replacement for VLOOKUP
XMATCH	Modern replacement for the MATCH function

Video: New dynamic array functions in Excel (about 3 minutes).

Quick navigation

ABS, AGGREGATE, AND, AVERAGE, AVERAGEIF, AVERAGEIFS, CEILING, CHAR, CHOOSE, CLEAN, CODE, COLUMN, COLUMNS, CONCAT, CONCATENATE, CONVERT, COUNT, COUNTA, COUNTBLANK, COUNTIF, COUNTIFS, DATE, DATEDIF, DAY, EDATE, EOMONTH, EXACT, FIND, FLOOR, GETPIVOTDATA, HLOOKUP, HOUR, HYPERLINK, IF, IFERROR, IFNA, IFS, INDEX, INDIRECT, INT, ISBLANK, ISERROR, ISEVEN, ISFORMULA, ISLOGICAL, ISNUMBER, ISODD, ISTEXT, LARGE, LEFT, LEN, LOOKUP, LOWER, MATCH, MAX, MAXIFS, MID, MIN, MINIFS, MINUTE, MOD, MODE, MONTH, MROUND, NETWORKDAYS, NOT, NOW, OFFSET, OR, PROPER, RAND, RANDBETWEEN, RANK, REPLACE, RIGHT, ROUND, ROUNDDOWN, ROUNDUP, ROW, ROWS, SEARCH, SECOND, SMALL, SUBSTITUTE, SUBTOTAL, SUM, SUMIF, SUMIFS, SUMPRODUCT, TEXT, TEXTJOIN, TIME, TODAY, TRANSPOSE, TRIM, UPPER, VLOOKUP, WEEKDAY, WEEKNUM, WORKDAY, YEAR, YEARFRAC 

Atanas Yonkov Blogger, Web Developer
yonkov.atanas@gmail.com

MS Excel is one of the most popular data analysis tools in the world. More and more companies greatly depend on this software and quite a lot of people are using it on a daily basis. However, from my experience, not many are taking full advantage of the opportunities that the program can offer. Here is my list of the top 20 most important and useful Excel functions, which everyone should use in order to increase his efficiency. Excel functions are also highly recommended over manual calculations, as they can greatly reduce the number of errors. Last but not least, learning these formulas is a wonderful opportunity for you to improve your Excel knowledge and become a confident MS Excel user.

Table of Contents

1. Sum

“Sum” is probably the easiest and the most important Excel function at the same time. You can use it to calculate sum of a range of cells.

In this example, the first formula sums the cells from A1 to A10. The second sums only cells A1 and A10. You can play around with it and try to use different ranges in order to get used to it. Please note that you can also use specific values inside the function, instead of references.

2. Average

Another very important function. As the name suggests, this formula estimates the average number from a range of cells. Suppose that we have a range of values in column A.

This will return the average value of the cells from A1 to A10.

Another must-use formula. It is relatively easy to use and very powerful at the same time. You can use this function to check whether a statement is true or false and return the stated value.

Here, the formula looks for sales over 100 € in cell “A2”. If this statement is true, the formula returns “yes”. If the sales are below 100 €, the formula returns “no”.

4. Sumif

Sumif is another very useful Excel formula. The formula will sum values, if a certain condition is met.

Let’s have a look at the above example. We have sales agents who register a certain number of sales. We want to know the total number of sales for each agent. The function = SUMIF (A1: A20, A2, B1: B20) sums the values of cells B1: B20 that correspond to the text in cell A2 (in the case of Ivailo). The guy has registered a total sales of 325 €. We can use the formula to calculate the turnover of the other agents as well.

5. Countif

Countif is a very useful function that works like a sumif. It sums under a certain condition. The difference between sum and count is that the count function counts the number of cells where certain condition is true. On the contrary, the sumif function sums the values inside the cells.

The formula in the above example checks how many times sales are made over 100 € and returns the number of occurances. You can also include more than one criteria by using countifs for that purpose.

PS: If you are not sure about the syntax of a function, you can always use the Insert function option in Excel (Just press the function sign on the left side of the function bar). In the next example, we will demonstrate how this works.

6. Counta

This formula counts the number of cells from a specific range which are not empty. It is very useful when you have thousands of rows and you want to know where this all ends. Example 6.

This will give you the number of rows that contain value, text or any other symbol.

7. Vlookup

Probably the most powerful Excel function. Very useful when you have to deal with more than one table, different sheets or even a different workbook. Vlookup lets you exract data from one table to another.

Let’s continue with the above example by adding another column “A” with customer numbers.

Note that there is information about the sales and the customer numbers, but the customers’ names are missing. However, we have another Excel sheet (Sheet2) with client names and client numbers.

Instead of taking our time to look from Sheet1 to Sheet2 and search for a match manually for each single row, we should use the following formula:

This formula looks up for the value in cell A2 (112 in our case) in sheet2, columns A & B (the “$” signs mean that we want to have a constant lookup range). The function then returns the value from the second column. The last part of the formula is 0. In this way we tell Excel to look for a match in a shuffle order, not only in one row.

Now, try to construct your own vlookup formula using the insert formula option.

In our case, it looks like this:

8. Left, Right, Mid

The left, right and mid functions are very important functions that allow you to extract a definite number of symbols from a string

In our example, with the Left formula, we take the first character from the left side. With the right formula we can do the same, but with the symbols from right to left. Keep in mind that the space is also a symbol.

9. Trim

Another exceptional MS Excel feature. The trim function removes unnecessary spaces after the words, when they are more than one. This can happen quite often in Excel. It may be that the information is extracted from different databases and it is full of unnecessary empty spaces between the words. This can be a huge problem because your Excel fomulas may not work. To get rid of the annoying empty spaces, we use the Trim formula.

In this example, the formula will remove any extra spaces in case it finds more than one.

10. Concatenate

This is a handy Excel function that comes to help when we want to combine cells. Here, we want to merge cells A1, A2, and A3. This can be done with the following function:

In this way, however, we will not have any spaces between the words. To add blanks between “I” and “ love”, we need to add a space. This can be addressed by adding quotes inside the function:

PS: You can also merge the cells by simply adding:

Try it yourself!

11. Len

Another amazing formula that can be applied in many situations. It is widely used for construction of more complicated formulas.

This function will count the number of symbols in a cell.

12. Max

The max function returns the largest value from a range.

This formula will look in cells A2:A8 and it will then extract the highest value from this range.

13. Min

The min function functions in a similar way as the max function, however it gives the opposite result. It extracts the lowest value from a range of data.

The formula from the above example will return the smallest number from the selected cells in column “A”.

14. Days

This is the function when you need to estimate the number of days between two days in a spreadsheet.

The formula will return the number of days that have passed.

15. Networkdays

Sometimes you want to work with working days only. This function operates in a very similar way to the above example. The difference is that it returns the working days that have passed, excluding the weekends.

16. SQRT

This is pretty simple and quite useful at the same time. As the name suggests, the formula gives the square root of a number

This will return the square root of 1444 (38). You can also use cell reference here, just like in many other Excel formulas.

17. Now

Sometimes you need to know the current date, when you open Excel spreadsheet. Example

This will return the current date. Do not forget to set the format to date. You can play around with it as much as you want. You can, for example, add or subtract days. =Now() -14 will return the date before two weeks.

18. Round

The Round function is very useful, when you have to work with rounded numbers. Excel can show numbers to a specific character, but retains the original number and uses it for calculations. In some cases, however, this could be an issue and we need to work with rounded numbers only. In such cases, the ROUND function comes into our help.

In the example, the number is rounded to the second decimal.

19.Roundup

This is a variation of the round formula that can help a lot In some cases. It rounds the value up to the closest integer. It is very useful in combination with other Excel formulas. Let’s have a look at this example:

Here, we want to find in which quarter of the year a current date is. The secret to this formula is simple math. The function takes the number of the month, e.g January is 1, February is 2, etc. and then divides it by 3, rounding up to the closest higher number.

20. Rounddown

Rounddown works in a similar way as Roundup, however it rounds the number down to the closest integer

This will return 20.

Excel has many useful functionalities. This article attempts to present the most important formulas in MS Excel in the best comprehensive way possible. We believe that these functions are a very good base for those of you who want to develop their Excel skills. By mastering these formulas, you can easily handle most day-to-day situations that may occur when working with Excel and it is a really nice opportunity further develop your skills.

Источник

Most Used Functions

Let’s check out the 10 most used Excel functions. Visit our section about functions for detailed explanations and more awesome functions.

Tip: download the Excel file and try to insert these functions.

1. COUNT

To count the number of cells that contain numbers, use the COUNT function in Excel.

Note: use COUNTA to count all cells that are not empty. COUNTA stands for count all.

2. SUM

To sum a range of cells, use the SUM function in Excel. The SUM function below sums all values in column A.

Note: you can also use the SUM function to sum an entire row. For example, =SUM(5:5) sums all values in the 5th row.

The IF function checks whether a condition is met, and returns one value if true and another value if false.

Explanation: if the score is greater than or equal to 60, the IF function shown above returns Pass, else it returns Fail. To quickly copy this formula to the other cells, click on the lower right corner of cell C2 and drag it down to cell C6.

4. AVERAGE

To calculate the average of a group of numbers, use the AVERAGE function (no rocket science here). The formula below calculates the average of the top 3 numbers in the range A1:A6.

Explanation: the LARGE function returns the array constant <20,15,10>. This array constant is used as an argument for the AVERAGE function, giving a result of 15.

5. COUNTIF

The COUNTIF function below counts the number of cells that contain exactly star + a series of zero or more characters.

Explanation: an asterisk (*) matches a series of zero or more characters. Visit our page about the COUNTIF function for more information and examples.

6. SUMIF

The SUMIF function below sums values in the range B1:B5 if the corresponding cells in the range A1:A5 contain exactly circle + 1 character.

Explanation: a question mark (?) matches exactly one character. Visit our page about the SUMIF function for more information and examples.

7. VLOOKUP

The VLOOKUP function below looks up the value 53 (first argument) in the leftmost column of the red table (second argument). The value 4 (third argument) tells the VLOOKUP function to return the value in the same row from the fourth column of the red table.

Note: visit our page about the VLOOKUP function to learn more about this powerful Excel function.

8. MIN

To find the minimum value, use the MIN function. It’s as simple as it sounds.

9. MAX

To find the maximum value, use the MAX function.

Note: visit our chapter about statistical functions to learn much more about Excel and Statistics.

10. SUMPRODUCT

To calculate the sum of the products of corresponding numbers in one or more ranges, use Excel’s powerful SUMPRODUCT function.

Explanation: the SUMPRODUCT function performs this calculation: (2 * 1000) + (4 * 250) + (4 * 100) + (2 * 50) = 3500.

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12 Most Useful Excel Functions for Data Analysis

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There are over 475 functions in Excel. This can make it overwhelming when you are getting started with data analysis.

With such a large variety of functions, it can be difficult to know which one to use for specific Excel tasks.

The most useful Excel functions are those that make the task seem easy. And the good news is that most Excel users have a toolkit of just a few functions that complete most of their needs.

This resource covers the 12 most useful Excel functions for data analysis. These functions provide you with the tools to handle the majority of your Excel data analysis tasks.

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The IF function is extremely useful. This function means we can automate decision making in our spreadsheets.

With IF, we could get Excel to perform a different calculation or display a different value dependent on the outcome of a logical test (a decision).

The IF function asks you for the logical test to perform, what action to take if the test is true, and the alternative action if the result of the test is false.

=IF(logical test, value if true, value if false)

In this example, we have displayed the word “Yes” if the delivery date in column C is more than 7 days later than the order date in column B. Otherwise, the word “No” is displayed.

2. SUMIFS

SUMIFS is one of the most useful Excel functions. It sums values that meet specified criteria.

Excel also has a function named SUMIF which does the same task except it can only test one condition, while SUMIFS can test many.

So you can essentially ignore SUMIF as SUMIFS is a superior function.

The function asks you for the range of values to sum, and then each range to test and what criteria to test it for.

=SUMIFS(sum range, criteria range 1, criteria 1, …)

In this example, we are summing the values in column C for the region entered into cell E3.

It is definitely worth exploring the SUMIFS function in more detail. It is an extremely useful Excel function.

3. COUNTIFS

The COUNTIFS function is another mega function for Excel data analysis.

It is very similar to the SUMIFS function. And although not mentioned as part of the 12 most useful Excel functions for data analysis, there are also AVERAGEIFS, MAXIFS, and MINIFS functions.

The COUNTIFS function will count the number of values that meet specified criteria. It, therefore, does not require a sum range like SUMIFS.

=COUNTIFS(criteria range 1, criteria 1, …)

In this example, we count the number of sales from the region entered into cell E3 that have a value of 200 or more.

When using the SUMIFS and COUNTIFS functions, the criteria must be entered as text or as a cell reference. This example uses both techniques in the same formula.

4. TRIM

This brilliant function will remove all spaces from a cell except the single spaces between words.

The most common use of this function is to remove trailing spaces. This commonly occurs when content is pasted from somewhere else or when users accidentally type spaces at the end of text.

In this example, the COUNTIFS function from before is not working because a space has been accidentally used at the end of cell B6.

Users cannot see this space, which means it is not identified until something stops working.

The TRIM function will prompt you for the text to remove spaces from.

In this example, the TRIM function is used in a separate column to clean the data in the region column ready for analysis.

The COUNTIFS function then has clean data and works correctly.

5. CONCATENATE

The CONCATENATE function combines the values from multiple cells into one.

This is useful for piecing together the different parts of text such as someone’s name, an address, a reference number or a file path or URL.

It prompts you for the different values to use.

=CONCATENATE(text1, text2, text3, …)

In this example, CONCATENATE is used to combine the firstname and lastname into a fullname. A space is entered for the text2 argument.

6. LEFT/RIGHT

The LEFT and RIGHT functions will do the opposing action of CONCATENATE. They will extract a specified number of characters from the start and end of text.

This can be used to extract parts of an address, URL, or reference for further analysis.

The LEFT and RIGHT functions request the same information. They want to know where the text is and how many characters you want to extract.

=LEFT(text, num chars)

=RIGHT(text, num chars)

In this example, column A contains a reference that is made up of the client ID (first two characters), a transaction ID, and then the region code (final character).

The following LEFT function is used to extract the client ID.

The RIGHT function can be used to extract the last character from the cells in column A. This example indicates whether the client is in the South or the North.

7. VLOOKUP

The VLOOKUP function is one of the most commonly used and recognizable functions in Excel.

It will look for a value in a table and return information from another column relating to that value.

It is great for combining data from different lists into one or comparing two lists for matching or missing items. It is an important tool in Excel data analysis.

It prompts for four pieces of information:

• The value you want to look for
• Which table to look in
• Which column has the information you want to return
• What type of lookup you would like to perform.

=VLOOKUP(lookup value, table array, column index number, range lookup)

In this example, we have a table containing sales from our employees. There is another table with further information about these employees (tables are kept small for the example).

We would like to bring the data showing which region the employee is based into the sales table for analysis.

The following formula is used in column D:

This can be one of the more difficult functions to learn for beginners to Excel formulas. You can learn VLOOKUP more in-depth in this article, or from our comprehensive Excel course.

8. IFERROR

Sometimes errors happen that may be innocent and sometimes these errors may be things you can predict. The VLOOKUP function from before is a typical example of this.

We have an error because there is a typo in the name in the sales table. This means that VLOOKUP cannot find that name and produces an error.

Using IFERROR we could display a more meaningful error than the one Excel provides, or even perform a different calculation.

The IFERROR function requires two things. The value to check for the error and what action to perform instead.

In this example, we wrap the IFERROR function around VLOOKUP to display a more meaningful message.

=IFERROR(VLOOKUP(B2,$G$2:$H$12,2,FALSE),»Name not found. Check both lists»)

9. VALUE

Often the set of data you need to analyze has been imported from another system or copied and pasted from somewhere.

This can often lead to data being in the wrong format, such as a number being stored as text. You cannot perform data analysis tasks such as SUM if Excel does not recognize them as a number.

Fortunately, the VALUE function is here to help. Its job is to convert numbers stored as text to numbers.

The function prompts for the text to convert.

In this example, the following formula converts the sales values stored as text in column B to a number.

10. UNIQUE

The UNIQUE function is a new function available to those using the Microsoft 365 version only.

The function wants to know three things:

• The range to return the unique list from
• Whether you would like to check for unique values by column or by row
• Whether you want a unique list, or a distinct list (items that occur only once).

=UNIQUE(array, by col, exactly once)

In this example, we have a list of product sales and we want to extract a unique list of the product names. For this, we only need to provide the range.

This is a dynamic array function and therefore spills the results. The blue border indicates the spilled range.

We can then use the SUMIFS function, mentioned earlier in this article, to sum the sales for each of those products.

This should look familiar to earlier. However, a # was used to reference the spilled range this time.

11. SORT

This is another function only available to Microsoft 365 subscribers. As the name suggests, it will sort a list.

The SORT function prompts for four arguments:

• The range to sort
• Which column to sort the range by
• What order to sort the range (ascending or descending)
• Whether to sort the rows or the columns.

=SORT(array, sort index,sort order, by col)

This is fantastic. And it can be used with the previous UNIQUE example to sort the product names in order.

For this, we only need to provide it with the range to sort.

12. FILTER

Following the SORT function, there is also a function to filter a list. Another function only available to Microsoft 365 users.

This function will filter a range. This is an extremely powerful function and is a dream for analyzing data and producing reports.

The FILTER function takes three arguments:

• The range to filter
• The criteria that specifies which results to return
• What action to take if no results are returned.

=FILTER(array, include, if empty)

In this example, only the results for the subject entered in cell F2 are returned.

Wrap Up

Learning the most useful Excel functions for data analysis mentioned in this article will go a long way to making Excel data analysis easier.

But there are still many more functions and also Excel features to learn to be a true data analysis whizz.

Two other essential Excel tools to master are Power Query and Power Pivot.

Power Query makes importing and transforming data for analysis a breeze. And Power Pivot is the perfect tool if you analyze large volumes of data. It can store huge volumes of data outside Excel and has its own formula language called DAX.

Take the Power Query and Power Pivot courses on GoSkills to fast-track your data analysis skills in Excel today.

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