What does the COUNT() function do?

In Microsoft Excel, the COUNT() function is used to count how many cells in a range contain numeric values. It does not count blank cells, text, or non-numeric data. This function is especially useful when working with large datasets where you need to know how many numbers are present in a column or row.

For example, if cells A1 to A5 contain the values 12, 15, "Text", 20, and blank, the formula =COUNT(A1:A5) will return 3, because only three cells (12, 15, and 20) contain numbers.