Counting can be tricky. It is not always obvious what you are counting, what counts and what doesn’t?
In Excel, there are several options of functions for counting, so you can get just what you are looking for.
=COUNT(value1, [value2], …) is the first option you might choose, but it is not the most generic. It will only count the number of cells with numbers in them.
If you are wanting to count cells with words (and numbers) then you need to use COUNTA. It will count all the non blank cells.
COUNTBLANK is self explanatory.
For each of these you need to provide reference to a cell or range of cells. For example, =COUNT(A1:A50)
There are two more counting functions to be aware of COUNTIF(range, criteria) and COUNTIFS(criteria_range1, criteria1, [criteria_range2, criteria2]…). These are great when you want to count only certain things from your list, like all the numbers greater than 10, or equal to 5, or how many times Bob appears in the list.
=COUNTIF(A1:A50,”>10″) Notice that you have to put some conditions in quote marks.
=COUNTIF(A1:A50,5) but not all conditions go in quote marks.
=COUNTIF(A1:A50,”Bob”) but if it is text, then it does need quote marks.
COUNTIFS(criteria_range1, criteria1, [criteria_range2, criteria2]…) is similar, but you can provide multiple ranges and conditions. Notice the square brackets meaning those criteria are optional. But, you do always need to provide them in pairs. You can’t add a criteria range without providing a criteria. The different criteria ranges that you enter can be different ranges, but must all be the same size.
