1.15 SUMIF Function

The SUMIF function sums a set of values if a condition is true. In the example below, the company sold some tacos, pizza and burritos. The sales price of each item is listed to the right (in column C) of the name of the item. In order to simplify the process of adding up the total amount earned for tacos, the total earned for Pizza and the total earned for Burrito's, you can use the SUMIF function. In cell F3 we provide an example of how to use this function for computing the sum of the amount earned for Tacos.

Notice that the SUMIF function has three parameters that you will need to enter. The first is the range that you will be evaluating to determine if the condition is true. In this case, we select the values in Column B, the name of the item sold. The second parameter you will define is which value from the search range (which you selected in the first parameter) you are looking for. In this cell we want to look for any time the item sold is a Taco. For text values, you will need to use parentheses. The final parameter you will need to define is to tell Excel which range to sum if the value in your first parameter matches the criteria you set in the second parameter. Notice that we told Excel to sum the values in Column C. The result of this formula will be the sum of all values in column C that correspond to a Taco being sold (in column B).