Excel is flexible enough to allow just about any calculation you might need.

In this example, each month’s sales were greater than the previous month except June, when the sales dropped back to April levels.Īs you continue working in Excel, you’ll learn additional uses of subtraction, such as subtracting dates or calculating change percentages. You can copy this formula to cells D11-H11 to complete your change calculations. Type “=” to tell Excel that you are beginning a formula.Each formula in Row 11 is the result of subtraction using the “-” (hyphen) as a minus sign. Row 11 shows the change from the prior month. Row 9 displays the total of sales for all cities.Īre the sales increasing each month? If so, by how much?

If youre completely new to Excel, you can learn how to create simple formulas in our completely. In this example, columns C through H show the sales for each month. To do this, youll need to use a very simple Excel formula. Unfortunately, Excel doesn’t have a SUBTRACT formula. You need to subtract the prior month’s sales from the current month’s sales. Your boss asks you to add a row that shows the change from the prior month. You have created a report that shows your company’s sales by month.