How to Use Excel Functions on a Range of Cells

Microsoft Excel is a widely used spreadsheet software distributed as a part of the Microsoft Office package. Excel organizes data in the form of worksheets (spreadsheets), allowing a user to make various calculations on data as well as plot graphs. Each spreadsheet consists of cells identified with a letter/number combination; for instance, "A5" or "E12." Excel built-in mathematical and other functions permit easy work with a cell range without typing each cell in this range explicitly.

Instructions

1. Open Microsoft Excel and press "Ctrl/N" to create a new document.

2. Click on a cell in the Excel spreadsheet where you need to insert a function and press the "=" keu on the keyboard.

3. Type the function name and the opening parenthesis "(" (for example, "SUM(").

4. Continue typing by entering the first cell in the range followed by a colon (":") and the last cell in the range. Finally, type the closing parenthesis, ")." For example in "SUM(A2:A12)" the sum operation will be applied to the cell range from A2 to A12.

5. Press "Enter" to insert the formula.

Tips & Warnings

• You can use several cell ranges within a function, separating each range with a comma; for example,

• "SUM(A2:A12, C3:C7)."

References

• "Excel 2007: The Missing Manual"; Matthew MacDonald; 2006
• Microsoft: List of worksheet functions in Excel