What’s the difference between a Formula and a Function in Excel?
Ever been guilty of using Excel as a fancy calculator? If so, you’d just be using a formula in Excel. If you entered a calculation such as =A1+A2 or =452*12, then that’s just a formula. If a formula is all you need, then that’s fine. But Excel can do so much more!
You may hear the two words function and formula used interchangeably, but they’re not technically the same. So, what’s the difference? A formula is an expression that uses cell references or hard-coded numbers to calculate the value of a cell. Sometimes a simple formula is all you need to get the right answer, but you can do so much more using functions.