ROUND: Excel Formulas Explained

I’m not going to lie to you; I’m a sucker for Excel. I have spent countless hours playing around with various formulas and functions. There is something satisfying about seeing data transform before your very eyes. Today, I want to talk about one of my favorite formulas – ROUND. ROUND is a simple formula that does exactly what it sounds like, it rounds numbers. Now, I know this might not sound like the most exciting formula to some of you, but trust me, it is incredibly useful. Let me give you an example. Let’s say you’ve just created a budget for the upcoming month, and you’ve calculated that you have $257.325 dollars left over. Sure, you could leave it like that, but it just looks messy. Instead, you can use ROUND to round the number to $257.33. The syntax for ROUND is straightforward. It looks like this: =ROUND(, ) The first parameter is the number you want to round, and the second is how many decimal places you want to round to. For example, if we take the number 2.345 and want to round it to one decimal place, we would use: =ROUND(2.345,1) The formula would return 2.3. You can also use negative numbers to round to whole numbers. If we take the number 7.345 and want to round it to the nearest whole number, we would use: =ROUND(7.345,0) The formula would return 7. One important thing to note is that the ROUND function always rounds up if the digit in the next decimal place is five or greater. For example, if we take the number 2.345 and want to round it to two decimal places, we would use: =ROUND(2.345,2) The formula would return 2.35. Now, I know what you’re thinking, “Okay, that’s great and all, but when would I ever use this?” Trust me; once you start using ROUND, you won’t be able to stop. Some common use cases include: - Formatting currency - Formatting percentages - Rounding grades - Analyzing data Let’s say you’re working on a project at work and need to analyze your budget's data for the past year. It can be overwhelming to look at raw data that has not been rounded. Using ROUND can make your data easier to digest. If you’re presenting this data to others, remember that no one wants to see decimals beyond a certain point. It can confuse non-mathematical people. Another example of when ROUND can come in handy is when you’re working with percentages. For instance, you could take a percentage of 45.6789% and round it to two decimal places using a formula like: =ROUND(45.6789%,2) The formula would return 45.68%. Lastly, if you’re a teacher grading your students, you should use ROUND to make the numbers more friendly. You could use a formula like: =ROUND(A2, 0) This formula would round up the grade in A2 to the nearest whole number. In conclusion, the ROUND formula may sound simple, but it can be a powerful tool that can take your Excel skills to the next level. As a marketer, I use Excel for everything from analyzing data to creating pivot tables. Of all the formulas I use, ROUND is one of my favorites. It’s versatile, easy to use, and can make a huge difference in your data's appearance and accuracy.