FREQUENCY Formula in Excel

 

What Does It Do ?

This function compares a range of data against a list of intervals.

The result shows how many items in the range of data fall between the intervals.

The function is entered in the cells as an array, that is why it is enclosed in { } braces.

Syntax

=FREQUENCY(RangeOfData,ListOfIntervals)

Formatting

No special formatting is needed.

Example 1

The following tables were used to record the weight of a group of children.

The =FREQUENCY() function was then used to calculate the number of children whose weights fell between specified intervals.

Example 2

This example uses characters instead of values.

A restaurant has asked 40 customers for their rating of the food in the restaurant.

The ratings were entered into a table as a single letter, E, V, A, P or D.

The manager now wants to calculate how many responses fell into each category.

Unfortunately, the =FREQUENCY() function ignores text entries, so how can the frequency of text be calculated?

The answer is to use the =CODE() and =UPPER() functions.

The =UPPER() forces all the text entries to be considered as capital letters.

The =CODE() function calculates the unique ANSI code for each character.

As this code is a numeric value, the =FREQUENCY() function can then be used!