Excel array countif formula

Question

I want to use COUNTIF function to evaluate how many items out of 2,0,0,5 are greater than 2? In Countif function, first argument is range and second is criteria. I have tried the below formula. Even tried using Ctrl+Shift+Enter at the end to evaluate. But doesn't seem to work.

=COUNTIF({"2","0","0","5"},">2")

Answer 1

COUNTIF doesn't accept array constants (as far as I know). Try this:

=SUMPRODUCT(--({2,0,0,5}>2))

---

You could also create a countif-style formula like this (the combination ctrl+shift+enter):

=COUNT(IF({2,0,0,5}>2,1,""))

Answer 2

Recommended reading: Array vs Range

Some functions like Offset, SumIf, CountIf, SumIfs, and CountIfs are designed to operate only on (multi-cell) range objects. Sum, SumProduct, Frequency, Linest, lookup functions, etc. take both range and array objects.

Array means: {2,0,0,5}

Range means:

To use countif, you have to use range in cells, defining the array in the formula on the go will not work.

=COUNTIF(A1:A4,">"&2)

Answer 3

I know this thread is a few years old, but I ended up here with a similar problem (how to use arrays, not ranges, with countif).

Although my end goal was a little different (I wanted to find items common to two arrays), I figure the workaround I came up with might be useful for others: I ended up using the "match" function coupled with "isnumber". The formula looked like this:

=isnumber(match({a},{b},0))

this will return an array of true/false which corresponds to the values in {a} that are also in {b}. In case it wasn't clear, {a} and {b} are arrays...