When you work in Excel, it’s often useful to round numbers to make them easier to read. One common technique is to always round numbers down for easy comparability. Let’s learn how to round down in Microsoft Excel.
How to Round Down in Excel
Excel’s ROUND function doesn’t automatically round down; it may round up or down depending on your input value. If you need to ensure you’re rounding numbers down, you’ll need to use the built-in ROUNDDOWN function. No matter what your number is, it will always be rounded down using this function.
Consider a cell containing the number 9.86. Using ROUND would round to 10, 9.9, and so forth.
Click into any empty cell, and then type =. This is the standard input to tell Excel that you’re beginning to input a formula in the cell. Continue by typing ROUNDDOWN, then (. So far, your formula will read:
=ROUNDDOWN(
Excel now asks for two inputs: Number and Num_Digits.Number is your input value, in this case, the cell containing 9.86. Click on it to select it, and add a comma. Your formula now reads:
=ROUNDDOWN(C1,
Num_Digits refers to the number of digits you want to round by. It can be a little confusing. Typing 0 would round down to the nearest integer value. Typing 1 would round to one decimal place.
In this formula, typing 0 would round 9.86 to 9. Typing 1 would round to 9.8. Typing 2 would leave your number the same, at 9.86.
Choose your desired number of digits (we’ll use 1 for this example), type it in, and close the parentheses by typing ). Your formula now shows:
=ROUNDDOWN(C1,1)
Finally, hit Enter on your keyboard. Your rounded-down value will appear in your selected cell.
As you can see, it’s quick and easy to round down in Excel.
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