<< Click to Display Table of Contents >> VAR (variance of a sample)

Note: VAR is supplemented by the new identical function VAR.S, which is available in newer versions of Microsoft Excel (2010 or later).

Syntax:

VAR(Number1, Number2 [, Number3 ...])

Description:

Estimates the variance of a population based on a sample.

Number1, Number2, etc. are single values, cell ranges, or arrays containing the values to be evaluated (sample).

If this function refers to empty cells or cells with error values, these are ignored. Also cells that contain text strings or logical values, but these can be entered directly into the list of arguments and thus be taken into account.

Annotation:

The variance is calculated using the "unbiased" or "n-1" method.

Example:

VAR(2, 2, 3, 4, 1) returns 1.3

See also:

VAR.S, VARA, VARPA, VAR.P/VARP, STDEV.S/STDEV, STDEV.P/STDEVP