Excel COUNTIF Function With Wildcard Search and Cell Reference

The COUNTIF function in Excel allows you to only count the number of cells that meet certain criteria. For example, the number of cells that the HR department appears in. With COUNTIF, you can do a wildcard search by using * (asterisk). The asterisk looks for any number of characters. For example, *east finds "Northeast" and "Southeast". With COUNTIF you can reference a cell also. The issue comes up with using a wildcard search with a cell reference. To accomplish this, we will use CONCATENATE or & with the cell reference.

Chapters:
0:00 Intro
0:15 COUNTIF explained
1:05 COUNTIF with wildcard
1:56 COUNTIF with cell reference wildcard

COUNTIF Function has two required arguments. The criteria is not case-sensitive. All caps or lowercase or mixed - it doesn't matter.
=countif(b2:b25,"HR") will count HR in cells B2 through B25. If cell B4 reads "HR Department" without the quotes, it could not be counted.
=countif(b2:b25,"*atl*") will count ATL in cells B2 through B25. If cell B4 read "Lives in ATL" without the quotes, it would be counted since we have wildcard before and after atl.

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NOTE: To count multiple criteria, use the COUNTIFS functions.

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[LittleTree]

I was looking for this for three hours!! Thank You!!! Exactly what I needed

[bakuscout]

Thank you so much, was trying desperately to find out how to solve this problem for over 30 min, found your video and worked like a charm.

[MariamSalama-eb]

Thanks a lot. Your explanation is very clear and short, exactly what I needed :)

[willbadel]

Thank you Chris, great video, exactly what i required

[ysaleung]

Hello! This was so helpful in understanding the different symbols. Helped me get it right. Can you do an example with other symbols with the wildcard like this: "<>*"&___&"*<>" because I can't seem to get it right incorporating other symbols.

[manuelpena]

Great it helpled me a lot, thank you, what if I want to add different criteria Eg =countifs(A2:A7, "apples", B2:B7, "red", B2B7, "green"), as seen my last two criteria are in the same column "B" but when i tried it in excel it didn't work, is there any way to use several criteria within the same column?

[Shriraj]

Hi Chris,
Can you please explain how to do it with numbers rather than text?

[laissaperez]

How can I determine how many clients in row B have had three sessions completed based on if column e, f, and g have dates entered