How to Add or Sum in MS Excel 2016? (with Pictures)

Adding is a basic mathematical operation, and is often used during the mathematical calculations. You have a variety of method to add or sum in Excel. One of the popular method to add in excel is AutoSum. It generates the sum of two or more cells in a sheet quickly.

In this section, we will discuss the other options which can also be used to add the cells in excel 2016. We will discuss how we can simply add numbers in the cells using the operator? How we can add using AutoSum, using SUMIF formula? We will also discuss how we can add only selected cells using Filter?

So let us start with the steps to add or sum in MS Excel 2016.

Operator

We can simply add the values in several cells using the sum operator (+). Here, you have to select a cell where you want the result of the addition to be stored. In the cell type the formula for adding the desired cells or numbers.

As you will go on typing the formula, the cells you have mentioned in formula will get highlighted. Below I have given an example of adding the cells using the add operator.

After typing the formula press enter to obtain the result.

AutoSum

Select a cell just below the column numbers which you want to add and click AutoSum, under the Editing group of Home tab.

AutoSum directly displays the formula for the sum and also highlight the cell range automatically taken by the AutoSum. You have to press enter to display the result. You can do the same for adding the numbers in a row also.

You can select the cell range for addition and click AutoSum.

It will display the addition result just below the last cell of your selected range.

SUMIF

SUMIF function adds the values of the selected range that validates the given condition/criteria in the formula.

Step 1: In the given example, I have taken the range from B2:B7 and the criteria is that the value of the cell must be >3 then only the cell value will be considered in the addition.

Step 2: In this example, the result will comprise of the addition of two cell only cell with value 6 and 4.

Syntax of SUMIF is as below:

SUMIF (range, “criteria”, [sum_range])

Here, the sum_range is optional, but if it is considered, then criteria is validated for the cell values in the range and the corresponding values of the given sum_range are added.

For example,

=SUMIF(A2:A7, “Charles”, B2:B7)

This will add the values in cell range B2:B7 only if the corresponding cell in the range A2:A7 has the value “Charles”.

Filter

In case, you need to add only the specific cells then you can use Filter. It will only make you visible the cell that you have selected.

Step 1: Select any cell from your data and click on Filter, in Sort and Filter group under the Home tab, you can also get it under Data tab.

Step 2: Drop down arrow will start appearing in the column headers. Click on the drop-down arrow of the column whose data you want to filter.

Like, I want to filter the name of the staff members and only want to view the data of Joseph, Charles and Davis. So, I have kept their corresponding checkboxes checked and have unchecked the others.