You can use formulas to calculate the content of a cell based on one or more criteria.

Formulas can include references to other cells or to ranges of cells, values that you specify or calculate, mathematical operators, and functions.

Excel 2008 includes over 200 functions that you can use to calculate, transform, retrieve, or otherwise manipulate alphanumeric data. Excel makes it easy to create formulas based on these functions, by modeling the required syntax for each function you work with.