The AVERAGE Function

Part of the Fundamentals section of Coddy's Excel journey — lesson 24 of 42.

An average answers "what's typical?", add the numbers up, divide by how many there are. You could build that by hand:

=(B2+B3+B4+B5)/4

But Excel has it packaged as a function:

=AVERAGE(B2:B5)

Same pattern as SUM, name, parentheses, range. With 80, 90, 70 and 100 in the range, the sum is 340, there are 4 values, and AVERAGE shows 85.

The function also counts the values for you. That's a bigger deal than it sounds: with the hand-built version, adding a fifth score means fixing both the sum and the /4. With AVERAGE you only stretch the range, the divide adjusts itself.

Averages aren't always whole numbers: the average of 5 and 8 is 6.5. That's fine, a decimal answer is still a correct answer.

Challenge

Beginner

Four test scores sit in B2:B5, one per test.

The label Average is in A6. In B6, write an AVERAGE formula for the four scores.

Different score sets will be tested, reference the range, not the numbers.

Try it yourself

Sheet1

	A	B
1	Test	Score
2	Test 1	80
3	Test 2	90
4	Test 3	70
5	Test 4	100
6	Average
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14

Test yourself

This lesson includes a short quiz. Start the lesson to answer it and track your progress.

All lessons in Fundamentals

1Meet the Spreadsheet

What Is a Spreadsheet?Cells and References Your First Cells Rows, Columns and the Grid Recap: Meet the Grid

4Cell References

Referencing Other Cells Formulas That Update Chained Formulas Ranges from A1 to A10 Recap: Cell References

7Decisions with IF

The IF Function Writing an IF Comparison Operators Nested IFs Recap: Decisions with IF

2Entering Data

Text and Numbers Building a Small Table Editing and Clearing Cells Numbers That Mean Something Recap: Entering Data

5Basic Functions

What Is a Function The SUM FunctionThe AVERAGE FunctionMIN and MAX COUNT and COUNTA Combining Functions Recap: Basic Functions

8Project: Grade Book

Grade Book Setup Totals and Averages Pass or Fail with IF Finishing the Grade Book

3Your First Formula

What Is a Formula?Writing a Formula Formulas with Cells Arithmetic Operators Order of Operations Recap: First Formulas

6Working with Text

Joining Text UPPER and LOWER Measuring Text with LEN LEFT, RIGHT and MID Recap: Working with Text