The Excel STDEV.S Function
Related Function:
STDEV.P Function
Standard Deviation
The Standard Deviation is a statistical measure, that is used to identify the amount that a set of values differ (or deviate) from the average value.
When your data set is a sample of a population, (rather than an entire population), you should use a slightly modified form of the Standard Deviation, known as the Sample Standard Deviation. The equation for this is:
where,
- x takes on each value in the set;
- x is the average (statistical mean) of the set of values;
- n is the number of values.
For further information, see the Wikipedia Standard Deviation page
Function Description
The Excel STDEV.S function calculates the sample standard deviation of a supplied set of values.
The function is new in Excel 2010 and so is not available in earlier versions of Excel. However, the Stdev.S function is simply an updated version of the Stdev function, which is available in earlier versions of Excel.
The syntax of the Stdev.S function is:
STDEV.S( number1, [number2], ... )
where the arguments, number1, [number2], etc, are between 1 and 255 numeric values, arrays of values, or references to cells containing numbers. The supplied arguments must provide at least two numeric values to the function.
Alternative Excel Standard Deviation Functions
Note that the Stdev.S function is used when calculating the standard deviation for a sample of a population (e.g. if your data set records the individual heights of a sample of UK males). If you are calculating the standard deviation of an entire population, you should use the Stdev.P function.
See the page on Standard Deviation in Excel for a comparison of the different Excel standard deviation functions.
Stdev.S Function Example
Imagine you want to find out the standard deviation of the heights of adult males in London. It is not possible to measure the height of all males, but you could take a sample of the population and measure their heights.
The above example spreadsheet on the right stores the measurements (in cm) of 3,000 adult males. The measured heights are stored in cells B3-B1002, D3-D1002 and F3-F1002.
The standard deviation of the heights of the sample group is calculated in cell H3 of the spreadsheet. The formula for this, (shown in the spreadsheet formula bar), is:
=STDEV.S( B3:B1002, D3:D1002, F3:F1002 )
As shown in cell H3, the Stdev.S function calculates the standard deviation in the measured heights to be 5.40 cm.
Other Argument Types
In the example above, the arguments to the Stdev.S function are input as 3 cell ranges. However, you can also input figures directly, as individual numbers or number arrays.
For example, if you wanted to include two further heights, of 176cm and 177cm into the sample, you could add these directly into the above function as follows:
Either as individual numbers:
=STDEV.S( B3:B1002, D3:D1002, F3:F1002, 176, 177 )
Or, as an additional array of numbers:
=STDEV.S( B3:B1002, D3:D1002, F3:F1002, {176,177} )
For further information and examples of the Excel Stdev.S function, see the Microsoft Office website.
Stdev.S Function Errors
If you get an error from the Excel Stdev.S function this is likely to be one of the following:
Common Errors
| #DIV/0! | - |
Occurs if fewer than two numeric values are supplied to the function. (Note that text representations of numbers, that are supplied as a part of an array, are not recognized as numeric values by the Stdev.S function) |
| #VALUE! | - | Occurs if any values that are supplied directly to the Stdev.S function are text values that cannot be interpreted as numeric values. |