← Excel from Scratch: Formulas, Functions, and Data Analysis
Lesson
Basic functions: SUM, AVERAGE, MIN, MAX, COUNT, COUNTA
Apply basic aggregate functions to a range and understand the difference between COUNT and COUNTA.
Functions: Excel's built-in tools
Functions: Excel's built-in tools
A function is a built-in tool that performs a calculation by name. Syntax: =NAME(arguments). The argument is most often a range of cells written with a colon: A1:A10 means “from A1 to A10 inclusive.”
The main aggregate functions: SUM adds up all the numbers in a range; AVERAGE calculates the average (arithmetic mean); MIN finds the smallest value; MAX finds the largest value.
Two functions for counting cells work differently: COUNT counts only cells that contain numbers; COUNTA counts all non-empty cells — numbers, text, dates, logical values. If some cells in a column contain text (“no data”), COUNT skips them and COUNTA includes them.
A note on language versions: in the US version of Excel, function arguments are separated by commas and function names are in English: =SUM(A1:A5, C1:C5). Some other language versions use a semicolon instead and translate the names — German Excel, for example, calls SUM “SUMME.” This course always uses the English names and the comma.
Lesson notes
Functions: Excel's built-in tools
A function is a built-in tool that performs a calculation by name. Syntax: =NAME(arguments). The argument is most often a range of cells written with a colon: A1:A10 means “from A1 to A10 inclusive.”
The main aggregate functions: SUM adds up all the numbers in a range; AVERAGE calculates the average (arithmetic mean); MIN finds the smallest value; MAX finds the largest value.
Two functions for counting cells work differently: COUNT counts only cells that contain numbers; COUNTA counts all non-empty cells — numbers, text, dates, logical values. If some cells in a column contain text (“no data”), COUNT skips them and COUNTA includes them.
A note on language versions: in the US version of Excel, function arguments are separated by commas and function names are in English: =SUM(A1:A5, C1:C5). Some other language versions use a semicolon instead and translate the names — German Excel, for example, calls SUM “SUMME.” This course always uses the English names and the comma.